miracle straight out of the skies.” In his commen-
tary about the Harlem Renaissance period, John-
son acknowledged the links between political
realities and cultural endeavors. He recounted
graphic details about race riots, such as the one
that occurred in the summer of 1917 and in
which one of his close friends suffered at the
hands of the police when he sought protection
from the unchecked white mob raging indiscrimi-
nately against African Americans. Johnson also
documented the rise of the periodical press and
the “new vigour” with which they proceeded to
represent issues of importance to Americans of
color. Of journals such as THE MESSENGER,
NEGRO WORLD, and THE EMANCIPATOR, he
noted that that they were “edited and written by
men who had a remarkable command of forcible
and trenchant English, the precise style for their
purpose.” Finally, Johnson concluded the volume
by asserting that “The Negro in New York still
has far, very far yet, to go and many, very many
things yet to gain. He still meets with discrimina-
tions and disadvantages. But New York guaran-
tees her Negro citizens the fundamental rights of
citizenship,” and the state “protects them in the
exercise of those rights.” Johnson invoked the fre-
quently overlooked and underestimated history of
African-American perseverance, triumph, and
patriotism that he had presented in his volume as
he generated an inspired closing statement.
As Johnson scholar Richard Fleming notes,
many reviewers suggested that Johnson’s volume
was a good but not especially innovative compila-
tion of facts and that “the strictly historical matter
of the book could have been produced by any com-
petent researcher” (Fleming, 85). According to
Fleming, though, the strength of Black Manhattan
lay in the firsthand experiences and accounts that
Johnson incorporated into his discussions of his-
tory, culture, literature, and politics.
Bibliography
Fleming, Robert. James Weldon Johnson.Boston: Twayne
Publishers, 1987.
Johnson, James Weldon. Black Manhattan.1930; reprint,
New York: Arno Press, 1968.
Price, Kenneth, and Lawrence Oliver. Critical Essays
on James Weldon Johnson.New York: G. K. Hall,
1997.
Black Man’s VerseFrank Marshall Davis
(1935)
A powerful collection of poems by FRANKMAR-
SHALLDAVISand the first of three that Davis pub-
lished with the Black Cat Press of CHICAGO. The
volume reflected Davis’s independent spirit; Davis
refused to include an introduction or prefatory re-
marks by any well-known writers. The collection of
poems, most of which reflected Davis’s experimen-
tal work with free verse, tapped into popular cul-
ture and also addressed issues of particular urgency
such as LYNCHING.
The book was praised widely and successfully
identified Davis as an emerging talent of the period.
It included poems such as “Lynched (Symphonic
Interlude for Twenty-one Selected Instruments,”
“Cabaret,” “Chicago’s Congo,” “Ebony Under
Granite,” and “What Do You Want America?” In
addition to positive reviews in THE NATION,
BLACK MAN’S VERSE was heralded by major
Harlem Renaissance figures such as ALAINLOCKE.
Davis’s work was included in the 1941 Negro Cara-
van anthology edited by STERLING BROWN,
ULYSSESLEE, and ARTHURDAVIS.
Critics long have considered Davis in relation
to influential writers such as LANGSTONHUGHES
and RICHARDWRIGHT, whom he met and came
to know well while living in Chicago. In 1941,
Sterling Brown and his co-editors suggested to
readers of Negro Caravanthat Davis was one of
the “[r]ecent poets of promise” and that Black
Man’s Versewas a book of “powerful social criti-
cism” (Brown, 282). More recently, scholar James
Smethurst has suggested that Davis, Hughes, and
Wright “significantly urbanized and proletarian-
ized the Communist-influenced concept of the
vernacular” (Smethurst, 29). The volume reflects
Davis’s social consciousness and desire to merge
political reality with literary forms. Black Man’s
Verseearned Davis a prestigious JULIUSROSEN-
WALDFELLOWSHIPin 1937.Bibliography
Brown, Sterling. The Negro Caravan: Writings by Ameri-
can Negroes.New York: Dryden Press, 1941.
Smethurst, James. The New Red Negro: The Literary Left
and African American Poetry, 1930–1946.New York:
Oxford University Press, 1999.Black Man’s Verse 43