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In this founding work in the literature of black protest, first published in 1903, W.E.B. Du Bois (18681963) eloquently affirms that it is beneath the dignity of a human being to beg for those rights that belong inherently to all mankind. He also charges that the strategy of accommodation to white supremacy would only serve to perpetuate black oppression. Essential reading for everyone interested in African-American history and the struggle for civil rights in America.
Synopsis
This 1903 landmark in the literature of black protest eloquently affirms that it is beneath the dignity of a human being to beg for those rights that belong inherently to all mankind, and charges that the strategy of accommodation to white supremacy would only serve to perpetuate black oppression. Essential reading in African-American history and the struggle for civil rights in America.
Synopsis
This 1903 landmark in the literature of black protest eloquently affirms that it is beneath the dignity of a human being to beg for those rights that belong inherently to all mankind, and charges that the strategy of accommodation to white supremacy would only serve to perpetuate black oppression. Essential reading in African-American history and the struggle for civil rights in America.
W.E.Du Bois was the foremost black intellectual of his time. The Souls of Black Folk (1903) his most influential work, is a collection of fourteen beautifully written essays, by turns lyrical, historical, and autobiographical. Here Du Bois records the cruelties of racism, celebrates the strength and pride of black America, and explores the paradoxical "double-consciousness" of African-American life. "The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line," he writes, prophesying the struggle for freedom that became his life's work. 1990 Edition
The Souls of Black Folk is at once a pivotal historical document, a revealing sociological study, and a literary work of unqualified excellence. In The Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B. DuBois gives evidence for the tragic plight of the Negro in the Black Belt, analyzes the effects of the Freedman's Bureau, explores the plaintive rhythms of Negro religion, and agonizes over the torment of Black double-consciousness. But the continuing power of this book comes not from its prophecy or its poetry, but from the reverberating explosion of DuBois' confrontation with Booker T. Washington. The Souls of Black Folk is a manifesto for revolution, immediateism and resistance now.
