Manchild in the Promised Land - Softcover

Brown, Claude

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0684864185 ISBN 13: 9780684864181

Publisher: Touchstone, 1999

Synopsis

"Manchild in the Promised Land" is indeed one of the most remarkable autobiographies of our time. This thinly fictionalized account of Claude Brown's childhood as a hardened, streetwise criminal trying to survive the toughest streets of Harlem has been heralded as the definitive account of everyday life for the first generation of African Americans raised in the Northern ghettos of the 1940s and 1950s. When the book was first published in 1965, it was praised for its realistic portrayal of Harlem -- the children, young people, hardworking parents; the hustlers, drug dealers, prostitutes, and numbers runners; the police; the violence, sex, and humor. The book continues to resonate generations later, not only because of its fierce and dignified anger, not only because the struggles of urban youth are as deeply felt today as they were in Brown's time, but also because the book is affirmative and inspiring. Here is the story about the one who "made it," the boy who kept landing on his feet and became a man.

About this title

Review:

William Mathes "Los Angeles Times" Sometimes a unique voice speaks out so clearly and with so much passion that it comes to speak for an era, a generation, a people...and we have to listen.

About the Author:

Claude Brown was born in New York City and grew up in Harlem. At age seventeen, after serving several terms in reform school, he left Harlem for Greenwich Village. He went on to receive a bachelor's degree from Howard University and attended law school. He also wrote a book called The Children of Ham in 1976. Manchild in the Promised Land evolved from an article he published in Dissent magazine during his first year at college.

About this edition

• Publisher: Touchstone
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0684864185
• ISBN 13: 9780684864181
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 415