Selected Poems of Langston Hughes

<p>With the publication of his first book of poems, <b>The Weary Blues</b>, in 1926, Langston Hughes electrified readers and launched a renaissance in black writing in America.&nbsp;&nbsp;The poems Hughes wrote celebrated the experience of invisible men and women: of slaves who "rushed the boots of Washington"; of musicians on Lenox Avenue; of the poor and the lovesick; of losers in "the raffle of night."&nbsp;&nbsp;They conveyed that experience in a voice that blended the spoken with the sung, that turned poetic lines into the phrases of jazz and blues, and that ripped through the curtain separating high from popular culture.&nbsp;&nbsp;They spanned the range from the lyric to the polemic, ringing out "wonder and pain and terror— and the marrow of the bone of life."</p> <p>The poems in this collection were chosen by Hughes himself shortly before his death in 1967 and represent work from his entire career, including "The Negro Speaks of Rivers," "The Weary Blues," "Still Here," "Song for a Dark Girl," "Montage of a Dream Deferred," and "Refugee in America."&nbsp;&nbsp;It gives us a poet of extraordinary range, directness, and stylistic virtuosity.</p> <p>Hughes himself selected the poems for this volume, including his most famous poems, and some that had only previously been privately printed. </p>

Author(s): Langston Hughes  

ISBN 10: 067972818X
ISBN 13: 9780679728184
Pages: 320
Format: Paperback
Publication: September 1990
Edition: Reissue