Bibliography
Boyd, Valerie. Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora
Neale Hurston.New York: Scribner, 2003.
Hemenway, Robert. Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary Biog-
raphy.Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1977.
Hurston, Zora Neale. The Complete Stories.New York:
HarperCollins, 1995.
Ebony and Topaz: A Collectanea
Charles S. Johnson, ed.(1927)
A volume of creative and nonfiction works se-
lected by CHARLESS. JOHNSON, the respected edi-
tor of OPPORTUNITY.Johnson described Ebony and
Topazas a “fairly faithful reflection of current in-
terests and observations in Negro life.” He ad-
dressed potential concerns of African-American
readers, whom he thought “will doubtless quarrel
with certain of the Negro characters who move in
these pages.” Insisting that “in life some Negroes
are distasteful to other Negroes,” Johnson argued
that readers should “[a]ccep[t] the materials of
Negro life for their own worth” and celebrate the
fact that “Negro writers, removed by two genera-
tions from slavery, are now much less self-con-
scious, less interested in proving that they are just
like white people, and, in their excursions into the
fields of letters and art, seem to care less about
what white people think, or are likely to think
about the race.” L. HOLLINGSWORTHWOOD,NA-
TIONALURBANLEAGUEpresident, Opportunityed-
itorial board member, and member of the FISK
UNIVERSITYBoard of Trustees, reinforced John-
son’s forceful message about African-American
creative autonomy. In his foreword to the collec-
tion, Wood emphasized that the collection had the
potential to perform some powerful cultural work.
It was a “challenging collection,” he suggested, be-
cause it “focuses, as it were, the appraising eyes of
white folks on the Negro’s life and of Negroes on
their own life and development in what seems...
a new and stimulating way.”
Johnson selected works by a number of rising
stars and lesser-known figures in the Harlem lit-
erary and artistic circles. He also provided histor-
ical perspective by including works by influential
writers from earlier periods, including Phillis
Wheatley’s “To a Gentleman, on His Voyage to
Great Britain for the Recovery of His Health”
and facsimile reproductions of manuscript pages
written by Paul Laurence Dunbar. Contemporary
writers included ARTHURHUFFFAUSET,JESSIE
FAUSET,GEORGIADOUGLASJOHNSON,HELENE
JOHNSON,MARITA BONNERwriting as JOSEPH
MAREE ANDREW,ALAIN LOCKE,BRENDA
MORYCK, and ANNESPENCER. Striking art work
by AARON DOUGLAS, Charles Cullen, and
Richard Bruce appeared alongside facsimile re-
productions of famous paintings from the impres-
sive art collection of Albert C. Barnes and
pamphlets such as Wheatley’s poem “An Elegy.”
Johnson also included works on African-Ameri-
can themes and history by white writers, includ-
ing “The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim Point” by
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, “Gullah” by Julia Pe-
terkin, and On the Road One Day, Lord,a one-act
play by Paul Green.
There were a considerable number of poems
published in the volume and a fairly balanced rep-
resentation of works by women and men of the
period. The set included “Divine Afflatus” by
Jessie Fauset, “Requiem” by Georgia Douglas
Johnson, “Idolatry” and “The Return” by ARNA
BONTEMPS, “And One Shall Live in Two” and “A
Student I Know” by Jonathan Brooks, “A Sonnet
to a Negro in Harlem” by Helene Johnson, “Ef-
figy” by LEWISALEXANDER, and other works by
Anne Spencer, FRANK HORNE, Lois Augusta
Cuglar, and George Chester Morse. The modest
array of short fiction included “Jumby” by Arthur
Huff Fauset, “General Drums” by JOHNMATHEUS,
“Tokens” by GWENDOLYNBENNETT, and “Verisimil-
itude” by John P. Davis. The two plays in the col-
lection were On the Road One Day, Lordby PAUL
GREENand The First One—A Play in One Actby
ZORA NEALE HURSTON. Nonfiction works in-
cluded the essay “The Negro in the Jazz Band” by
Jose Salaverria and translated from the Spanish by
Dorothy Peterson, “The Natural History of Race
Prejudice” by Ellsworth Faris, “John Henry—A
Negro Legend” by Guy Johnson, and “Racial Self-
Expression” by E. FRANKLINFRAZIER.
This strength of this collection lay in its
breadth, the intensity of the works included, and
the timeliness of its publication. Johnson noted
that the contents represented four discernible
themes and areas of concern. The first was de-
voted to African-American folk life, and the134 Ebony and Topaz: A Collectanea