wanted the black artist to “Clean out the world
for virtue and love.” Neal further explained, “The
Black Arts Movement is radically opposed to any
concept of the artist that alienates him from his
community. Black Art is the aesthetic and spiri-
tual sister of the Black Power concept. As such, it
envisions an art that speaks directly to the needs
and aspiration of Black America.... The Black
Arts and the Black Power concept both relate to
the Afro-American’s desire for self-determination
and nationhood.” Neal further explained, “A main
tenet of the Black Power concept is the necessity
for Black people to define the world in their own
terms. The Black artist has made the same point
in the context of aesthetics” (187).
As editors Baraka and Neal selected for in-
clusion in Black Fire writers and works that met
their criteria, including James T. Stewart, CALVIN
C. HERNTON, Sun-Ra, DAV I D HENDERSON, SONIA
SANCHEZ, and Yusef Imam. The included essays
bore titles that denoted the authors’ perspec-
tive, for example, Stewart’s “The Development
of the Black Revolutionary Artist” and Stokeley
Carmichael’s “Toward Black Liberation.” Revolu-
tionary fiction and samplings of agitprop drama
popularized by Baraka were also included, such
as Neal’s “Sinner Man Where You Gonna Run
To?,” Jimmy Garrett’s “We Own the Night,” and
ED BULLINS’s “How Do You Do.” Much like the
Calvinist settlers of colonial America who were
convinced God had sent them on an “errand into
the wilderness” to establish a “city upon a hill,”
Baraka closes his foreword with a resonant sense
of mission: “We are presenting, from God, a tone,
your own. Go on. Now” (xvii).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Baraka, Amiri, and Larry Neal, eds. Black Fire: An
Anthology of Afro-American Writings. New York:
Bobbs Merrill, 1968.
Neal, Larry. “The Black Arts Movement.” In The Black
American Writer. Vol. 2: Poetry and Drama, edited
by C. W. E. Bigsby, 187–202. New York: Penguin
Books, 1969.
Wilfred D. SamuelsBlack Issues Book Review (BIBR)
In the first published volume of Black Issues Book
Review (BIBR) (January–February 1999), the edi-
tors declared, “So it is with great pride that Cox,
Matthews & Associates, Inc., presents the first is-
sues of a magazine passionately devoted to books
by and about the people of the great African di-
aspora.” Despite this stated global mission, BIBR
was also to be “the premiere source of information
and news about books for the African American
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tor in chief William E. Cox, executive editor Susan
McHenry, and editorial advisers E. ETHELBERT
MILLER, Angela Dodson, WANDA COLEMAN, and
Sheila Walker.
Cox explained that BIBR would not be a tra-
ditional review in which critics offered lofty
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politics, economics—“indeed every fact of life
we think and write about as black people” (5). In
summary, Black Issues Book Review was committed
to examining the range of issues that shape and
define black culture. “New times, new challenges
and new publication attuned to it all” (7).
Each issue of BIBR includes news and articles
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Science fiction writer OCTAVIA BUTLER graced
the cover of the first issue, which also included52 Black Issues Book Review (BIBR)