Get Cotton Comes to Harlem from Amazon.com

Cotton Comes to Harlem Summary
Chester Himes

Everything you need to understand or teach Cotton Comes to Harlem by Chester Himes.

Cotton Comes to Harlem Summary & Study Guide

Cotton Comes to Harlem Summary

The novel's main theme is expressed indirectly by the frequent scenes of horribly intense violence and directly by the remarks of one of Himes's two black detective heroes, when Grave Digger Jones explains that only three things can be done about Harlem's high crime rate. Either the criminals must be made to pay for their crimes or the people must be paid enough to live decently. The other choice is to let the...

(read more from the Short Guide)

Study Pack

The Cotton Comes to Harlem Study Pack contains:

Cotton Comes to Harlem Short Guide

Characters

Social Concerns

Techniques

Themes

Adaptations

Literary Precedents

Related Titles

Chester Himes Biographies (5)

Chester Bomar Himes

1,997 words, approx. 7 pages

His reputation rests largely on his detective novels, which in their own right rank with the best noir fiction, but Chester Himes (1909-1984) was hardly a man to be pigeonholed. In his lifetime he pub... Read more

Chester (Bomar) Himes

2,642 words, approx. 9 pages

Chester Himes is one of the curiosities of American literature, a fiercely independent black writer whose many faults have alienated both white and black critics, save for a few who have insisted that... Read more

Chester (Bomar) Himes

7,935 words, approx. 27 pages

Novelist, essayist, short-story writer, and journalist, Chester Himes made his mark as a satirist and as a writer of detective novels. In 1970 John A. Williams maintained that "Himes is perhaps the ... Read more

Chester (Bomar) Himes

12,174 words, approx. 41 pages

Chester Bomar Himes's career extended from the mid 1930s to the mid 1980s, a time of enormous social change and racial turmoil in the United States. His work is remarkable for the honesty, intensity, ... Read more

Chester (Bomar) Himes

5,816 words, approx. 20 pages

In 1957 Chester Himes was so down and out in Paris that he was ready to write almost anything to make a buck--even a detective novel. Himes was at that point a "serious" novelist who had never written... Read more

Download the Study Pack

BookRags

Cotton Comes to Harlem SummaryChester Himes

Cotton Comes to Harlem Summary

Study Pack

Cotton Comes to Harlem Short Guide

Chester Himes Biographies (5)

Cotton Comes to Harlem Summary
Chester Himes