"A new Penguin Classics series that recovers and rediscovers the work of African American poets from the 19th and 20th centuries, curated by Joshua Bennett and Jesse McCarthy As scholars of African American literature and cultural history, Bennett and McCarthy repeatedly find themselves struck by the number of exciting poets they come across in long-out-of-print collections and forgotten journals, whose work has been neglected and, in some cases, entirely ignored, even by those academic circles devoted to the study of Black poetry. Minor Notes is an excavation initiative that addresses this problem by recovering archival materials from these understudied, though supremely gifted, African American poets of the 19th and 20th centuries. By pairing neglectedcollections of poetry with prefatory commentary provided by contemporary poets, Minor Notes bridges scholarly interest with the growing audience outside the university that reads, writes, and circulates Black poetry. Minor Notes Vol. 1 features the work of three poets. Published in 1837, Poems by a Slave is one of the lesser-known works by George Moses Horton (1798-1883), once popularly known as the "black bard of North Carolina." Visions of the Dusk (1915) is an American prose poem known for its formal innovation by Fenton Johnson, a poet, essayist, editor, and educator from Chicago. Georgia Douglas Johnson was the most widely read black woman poet in the US during the first three decades of the 20th century. Bronze: A Book of Verse (1922) was introduced with a foreword by W.E.B. Du Bois. Bennett and McCarthy will provide an introduction"--
Recovering archival materials from understudied, though extraordinarily gifted, African American poets of the 19th and 20th centuries, this scholarly volume features the works of three poetsGeorge Moses Hortons Poems by a Slave, Fenton Johnsons Visions of the Dust and Georgia Douglas Johnsons Bronze: A Book of Verse. Original.
Recenzijos
You feel youre meeting them on a human level. The book is slim and portable, as the best poetry books are () Bennett and McCarthy, in their introduction, set out their criteria for inclusion in Minor Notes. They list things like minimal appearance in anthologies and very little, if anything, in the way of secondary literature focusing on their work. But it becomes plain that they chose these poets because they still speak across generations. This is a passion project.() This is a reclamation project that goes through you like a spear. Dwight Garner, The New York Times Joshua Bennett and Jesse McCarthy, both scholars of African American literature, aim to widen the canon of Black poetry by spotlighting poets who have been overlooked () giving readers an understanding of their unique voice and poetic concerns. () David Wadsworth Cannon Jr., Henrietta Cordelia Ray, Anne Spencer, and other poets interrogate everything from labor politics to friendship in finely wrought lyrics that delight and surprise, prompting the reader to wonder how these geniuses could have been sidelined for so long. Poets & Writers
The first in a series recovering the out-of-print words of Black poets whose work shaped the 19th and 20th centuries, Minor Notes, Volume 1 draws a bright line between the creations of the past and those of todays bards. Curated by Joshua Bennett and Jesse McCarthy, while featuring a foreword from former poet laureate Tracy K. Smith, the book centers clear, resonant voiceslike that of Angelina Weld Grimkés, who ruminates joyfully on the beauty of living in a Black body. Essence
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| Introduction |
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3 | (2) |
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On the Silence of a Young Lady, On Account of the Imaginary Flight of Her Suitor |
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5 | (2) |
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7 | (1) |
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10 | (1) |
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11 | (1) |
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On the Death of an Infant |
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On the Truth of the Saviour |
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On the Evening and Morning |
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26 | (2) |
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28 | (1) |
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Consequences of Happy Marriages |
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29 | (2) |
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Lines, On Hearing of the Intention of a Gentleman to Purchase the Poet's Freedom |
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31 | (2) |
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33 | (1) |
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The Loss of Female Character |
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34 | (3) |
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37 | (1) |
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My God in Heaven Said to Me |
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52 | (6) |
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68 | (3) |
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71 | (1) |
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Sonnet to Those Who See but Darkly |
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72 | (1) |
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73 | (1) |
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74 | (1) |
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75 | (1) |
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76 | (1) |
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To Samuel Coleridge Taylor, upon Hearing His "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child" |
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77 | (1) |
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78 | (1) |
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Shall I Say, "My Son, You're Branded"? |
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79 | (1) |
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80 | (1) |
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81 | (1) |
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82 | (3) |
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87 | (1) |
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88 | (1) |
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89 | (1) |
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90 | (1) |
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In Memoriam Paul Laurence Dunbar |
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91 | (2) |
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Ode on the Twentieth Century (A Dream-Prophecy) |
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93 | (6) |
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David Wadsworth Cannon Jr. |
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99 | (6) |
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99 | (2) |
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101 | (4) |
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II "Under the Hawthorn Tree" |
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105 | (6) |
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105 | (1) |
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106 | (1) |
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129 | (6) |
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World Weariness--"Weltschmerz" |
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145 | (1) |
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[ God Never Planted a Garden] |
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146 | (1) |
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147 | (1) |
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148 | (1) |
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Before the Feast of Shushan |
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149 | (2) |
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151 | (1) |
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152 | (1) |
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153 | (1) |
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154 | (1) |
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[ Thou Art Come to Us, O God, This Year] |
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156 | (5) |
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161 | (1) |
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162 | (1) |
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163 | (1) |
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164 | (1) |
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To the Dunbar High School |
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176 | (1) |
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Oh, My Heart, for the Spring! |
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177 | (1) |
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178 | (1) |
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When the Green Lies over the Earth |
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179 | |
Dr. Joshua Bennett (External Editor) Joshua Bennett is a Professor of English and Creative Writing at Dartmouth College. He is the author of four books of poetry and criticism: The Sobbing School (Penguin, 2016)-winner of the National Poetry Series and a finalist for an NAACP Image Award-as well as Being Property Once Myself (Harvard University Press, 2020), Owed (Penguin, 2020), and The Study of Human Life (Penguin, 2022). Earlier this year, he received a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Whiting Award for Poetry and Nonfiction.
Joshua earned his Ph.D. in English from Princeton University, and an M.A. in Theatre and Performance Studies from the University of Warwick, where he was a Marshall Scholar. He has recited his original works at the Sundance Film Festival, the NAACP Image Awards, and President Obama's Evening of Poetry and Music at the White House. He has also performed and taught creative writing workshops at hundreds of middle schools, high schools, colleges, and universities across the United States, as well as in the U.K. and South Africa.
Joshua has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, MIT, and the Society of Fellows at Harvard University. His writing has been published in Best American Poetry, The New York Times, The Paris Review, Poetry Magazine, and elsewhere. Alongside his friend and colleague, Jesse McCarthy, he is the founding co-editor of Minor Notes, a Penguin Classics book series dedicated to minor poets within the black expressive tradition. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife and son, Pam and August, and their family dog, Apollo 5.
