Jesse B. Semple is certainly no romantic hero, protest victim or militant leader, no charismatic character for the young to emulate…. Simple reached a wide, appreciative black audience because he appeared in newspapers readily available to black readers, and he reached white readers when Hughes began to publish the tales in book form. What is Simple's appeal? My contention is that the popularity of the tales is based on the narrative technique of the artist; that is, on the artistic devices used by Langston Hughes, a writer who not only knew his medium, but also knew the people whom he addressed through that medium: 1) the sure fire appeal of the skit technique, 2) an apparent artlessness and simplicity in the development of theme and character, 3) reader identification, and 4) the intermittent sound of the blues in prose.

The skit technique, adapted to the demands of the newspaper column, is a...