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Book Cover for: The Richer, the Poorer: Stories, Sketches, and Reminiscences, Dorothy West

The Richer, the Poorer: Stories, Sketches, and Reminiscences

Dorothy West

The stories contained here are as American as jazz, and as wise and multifaceted as their writer. Dorothy West's metier is the unique crucible in which America places its black middle class, but her themes are universal: the daily misunderstandings between young and old, men and women, rich and poor that can lead to tragedy; and the ways in which bonds of family and community can bring us together, and tear us asunder. Dorothy West's autobiographical essays explore the poles of her remarkable life - from growing up black and middle-class in Boston to her near-mythic trip to Moscow in 1933 with Langston Hughes and other Harlem Renaissance writers to life on her beloved Martha's Vineyard. They cohere into a beautiful and poignant memoir of a singular American life, a memoir that communicates with her short stories in a host of fertile ways. Taken as a whole, The Richer, The Poorer is a triumphant celebration of the life and work of one of America's genuine treasures.

Book Details

  • Publisher: Anchor Books
  • Publish Date: Jun 20th, 1996
  • Pages: 272
  • Language: English
  • Edition: undefined - undefined
  • Dimensions: 8.54in - 5.50in - 0.66in - 0.77lb
  • EAN: 9780385471466
  • Categories: American - African American & BlackGeneral

About the Author

Dorothy West founded the Harlem Renaissance literary magazine Challenge in 1934, and New Challenge in 1937, with Richard Wright as her associate editor. She was a welfare investigator and WPA relief worker in Harlem during the Depression. Her first novel, The Living Is Easy, appeared in 1948 and remains in print. Her second novel, The Wedding, was a national bestseller and literary landmark when published in the winter of 1995. A collection of her stories and autobiographical essays, The Richer, The Poorer, appeared during the summer of 1995. She died in August 1998, at the age of 91.

Praise for this book

"West writes like a social historian, capturing significant moments that seem to alter lives forever or change nothing at all."--Los Angeles Times

"Unforced perfection . . . beautifully cadenced. West has shown the power of what is left unspoken."--Chicago Tribune

"Dorothy West is an epic storyteller."--Quarterly Black Review of Books