Review by Choice

During his lifetime (1872-1906), Dunbar was the most famous African American writer in the world, publishing several collections of poetry, a novel, a short story collection, and a Broadway musical and receiving praise from William Dean Howells. An important precursor to the later flourishing of arts in the Harlem Renaissance, Dunbar has been appreciated most for his poetry and his masterful use of dialect. This edition of uncollected works greatly expands the Dunbar canon. The volume contains three musicals, 41 poems, 15 essays, seven short stories (one, “Ole Conju’in Joe,” never before published), six songs, two short plays, and most notably an unpublished play, Herrick. Notable in Dunbar's artistic oeuvre because it does not address Dunbar's usual interest in black characters or black dialect, Herrick demonstrates Dunbar's ability to write in the highly refined style of an 18th-century English comedy of manners. Dunbar wrote the play, which is based loosely on the life of poet Robert Herrick and his attempts to win the Lady Cynthia, when he was in England and preparing to marry Alice Moore. Martin and Primeau's chronology of Dunbar's life, their bibliography, and their introduction to the individual sections (each based on a genre) are extremely useful. All collections of American literature; all levels.

Choice