Home to Harlem (Magill’s Choice: American Ethnic Writers)
At a glance:
- Author: Claude McKay
- First Published: 1928
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Social realism
- Time of Work: Immediately following World War I
- Setting: Harlem, New York and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
- Principal Characters: Jake, Ray, Felice, Congo Rose, Agatha, Zeddy Plummer, Billy Biasse
- Genres: Long fiction, Realism, Social realism
- Subjects: New York, North America or North Americans, Northeast, U.S., United States or Americans, Love or romance, Race, Sex or sexuality, New York City, Prostitution or prostitutes, 1920’s, Inner cities or inner-city life, World War I
- Locales: Harlem, NY, Pittsburgh, PA
The Novel
The title Home to Harlem suggests that the famous New York “Black Belt” is the place to which African Americans return when they want to find true comfort and harmony, when they want to be among their “family” and friends, even though, like most of the characters, they have migrated from elsewhere—from Haiti, from Virginia, from Maryland (as in the cases of Ray, Jake and Zeddy, and Agatha). The novel is essentially an account of life in Harlem as seen through the experiences of Jake, who (though not a native New Yorker) has come to regard Harlem as...
[The entire page is 3276 words long]
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