SIMPLE SPEAKS HIS MIND

by Langston Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 14, 1950

These stories might be called a Harlem Mr. Dooley -- a comparison that will carry substantial weight with the past generation who still remember Finley Peter Dunne's classic character Langston Hughes, a Harlemite himself, has captured the idiom, the pattern of thinking, the personality of not only his stock character, ""Simple"", but many of his fellows. Simple airs his views over women, taxes, unemployment, government, Jim Crowism, religion, sex. The Law, with the moot problem of race relations a constant itch. He needs his beer (and sometimes when profoundly disturbed promotes himself to whiskey)- and usually needs the money to pay for it as well. He's a lowly philosopher of no mean gifts, an observer and commentator on the ways of his fellow man, a humorist albeit usually unconsciously. His problems and interests are any man's problems and interests, and Langston Hughes, using himself an catalyst, has caught their very fundamental qualities, the essence of the almost illiterate of his race, Southern-born, city bred. There's understanding and tenderness, and skilled avoidance of any semblance of sentimentality. The stories were written originally for the Chicago Defender, and well merit publication in book form. Hughes' hardly earned reputation in varied literary fields will stand him in good stead in launching this volume.

Pub Date: April 14, 1950

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1950

Categories: FICTION