The Harlem Renaissance was the most influential single movement in African American literary history. The movement laid the groundwork for subsequent African American literature, and had an enormous impact on later black literature world-wide. In its attention to a wide range of genres and forms – from the roman à clef and the bildungsroman, to dance and book illustrations – this book seeks to encapsulate and analyze the eclecticism of Harlem Renaissance cultural expression. It aims to re-frame conventional ideas of the New Negro movement by presenting new readings of well-studied authors, such as Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes, alongside analysis of topics, authors, and artists that deserve fuller treatment. An authoritative collection on the major writers and issues of the period, A History of the Harlem Renaissance takes stock of nearly a hundred years of scholarship and considers what the future augurs for the study of 'the New Negro'.

Short-listed, 2023 MSA Edition, Anthology, and Collection Prize (Biennial), The Modernist Studies Association

‘Highly recommended.’

C. A. Bily Source: Choice

‘this is not your grandfather's Harlem Renaissance … At every turn and in every way ... A History of the Harlem Renaissance invites and inspires readers to reconceive and reimagine both the nature and the extent of Black modernist cultural production.’

Tim Ryan Source: Style