Black Is the Color of the Cosmos: Essays on Afro-American Literature and Culture, 1942-1981

by Charles T. Davis, Henry Louis Gates Jr. (Editor), A. Bartlett Giamatti (Foreword)

376 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1989

Reviews

[Matt Sautman · Rating 5 out of 5]

The binding on this book is terrible. I find that what we was used to bind this collection of essays by Charles T. Davis back in 1982 has not aged well. Pages consistently fall out as a result of this. However, the content of this book is phenomenal and provides a foundational understanding of Henry Louis Gates own scholarship. Given the early nature of these essays in the field of African American literature, it is clear that there are some absences and/or silences in the literary history Davis constructs across these essays that are glaring. Thankfully Gates himself, Carby, Cooper, and others have set forth to expand this history further. This said, Davis’s thoughts on the genre of slave narratives, the Harlem Renaissance(sans his take on Nella Larsen), the Black Arts Movement, and the concept of African American’s double history make this book incredibly relevant to scholars interested in this field.