THE CRISIS OF THE NEGRO INTELLECTUAL

by Harold Cruse ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 25, 1967

Despite the author's claim that some of his best friends are liberals, his book is a brilliant, but polemical, thrust against the advocates of integration who, he asserts, have misdirected Negroes from truly radical and creative goals. From his perspective of Negro separatism, especially cultural, he analyzes the last fifty years of the Negro intellectual whose crisis arises from his failure to clearly define specifically Negro goals. He is not a racist in the sense of preaching hatred. Rather he would have each race preserve its specific characteristics. His debt is clearly to Randolph Bourne from whom he borrows the idea of cultural separatism and to C. Wright Mills from whose framework of ""power-elite"" he creates a devastating analysis of American society and the Negro. The book is not an easy one to read; many of the points made will be clear only to the younger radicals who feel an emotional affinity with the New Left, while white liberals will have to reappraise themselves in light of it. Its polemics may cause some unease and blur the arguments, but once it is understood that this book is written as an instrument for radical change, its genuine wisdom may be separated from its ideology.

Pub Date: Oct. 25, 1967

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Morrow

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1967

Categories: NONFICTION