MASTER OF FALCONHURST

by Kyle ?nstott ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 27, 1964

What happens in this novel all happened about fifty years ago in Birth of a Nation with a slight change in color scheme. There may some day be a Negro epic novel; this fails. In its stupendous banalities, ""dogged his footsteps"" is as recurrently Homeric as ""the wine-dark sea,"" while the story runs its course from Abolition days to the rise of the Klan. Hammond Maxwell is the master of Falconhurst. He breeds Negroes for the market in New Orleans and although he loves his wife above all others, ""his taste for colored flesh was amply gratified on his own plantation."" But as one Klansman later remarks, ""Hammond Maxwell al'ays did spoil his niggers. Makin' out they 'most human.'"" The collapse of the Southern feudal system and the awakening of the Negroes is revealed in a prose which is close to jargon, even when the author is at his most removed and authoritative. In the climax, the Negro hero who had become both the Master of Falconhurst and a Senator, is crucified, while his wife is raped to death .... Up from slavery, back to Yerby.

Pub Date: June 27, 1964

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Dial

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1964

Categories: FICTION