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Charles W. Chesnutt.
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The novels and short stories of Charles W. Chesnutt (1858-1932) earned him a prominent place in American literary history. He also wrote many essays and newspaper articles in which he spoke out strong...
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Charles Waddell Chesnutt was America's first important black writer of fiction; no black American before him had created a sustained body of significant work. Since his life spanned nearly two halves ...
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Charles W. Chesnutt was the first important Afro-American writer of fiction to enlist the white-controlled publishing industry in the service of his social message, touching a significant portion of t...
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Charles Waddell Chesnutt, a "voluntary Negro" (one who, though so fair as to be mistaken for white, chooses not to "pass"), was born in Cleveland, Ohio, the eldest child of Andrew Jackson Chesnutt and...
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In the following essay, Fienberg views Charles Chestnutt's short story “The Wife of His Youth” as a reflection of the author's own efforts to define himself as a black auth...
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In the following essay, Hathaway compares Chesnutt's pre-Freudian story “The Sheriff's Children” and Langston Hughes's post-Freudian “Father and Son,” ...
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In the following essay, originally published in the American Transcendental Quarterly, in 1990, Fienberg delineates the differences between Chesnutt's The Wife of His Youth, and The Conjure Wom...
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In the following essay, originally published in his To Wake the Nations: Race in the Making of American Literature in 1993, Sundquist discusses Chesnutt's skepticism about black American folk b...
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In the following essay, originally published as “Listening to ‘The Goophered Grapevine’ and Hearing Raisins Sing” in American Literary History in 1994, Slote explores race ...
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In the following essay, Wonham details Chesnutt's literary career and the author's dialect and non-dialect short stories.
Introduction
One of the many arresting ironies of Charles W. Che...
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In the following essay, Duncan discusses Chesnutt's probing of race consciousness in the United States and the manner in which the writer's short stories add a “stanza” to ...
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Charles Waddell Chesnutt
Charles W(addell) Chesnutt
Critical Essay by Lorne Fienberg
