William Edward Burghardt Du Bois, Darkwater

Robert W. Williams (Bennett College)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.5: African American Writing and Culture of the United States.
Vol. editors: Sofia Ahlberg (Uppsala University), Philathia Bolton (University of Akron), Patrick Chura (University of Akron), J. Michael Duvall (College of Charleston), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), A Yemisi Jimoh (University of Massachusetts Amherst), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Tony Papanikolas (San Jose State University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1920

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Essays/ Lectures (any)
Story Collection

Resources

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Recommended Reading

Darkwater: Voices from within the Veil

(1920), W.E.B. Du Bois presented a variety of his essays and short fiction on race, class, and gender topics. Some pieces were knife-edged and audacious as befits the book’s intention to challenge prevailing views on social issues. He mixed previously published works and new pieces as he did in

The Souls of Black Folk

(1903).

Darkwater

shared other similarities with the earlier book. Notably Du Bois continued to explore and promote African American agency – i.e., the capacity of persons of colour to actively and consciously guide their own destinies – and to advocate voting rights and the end of Jim-Crow segregation. Also as in

Souls

, Du Bois examined the historical factors constraining the progress of African Americans and he employed the…

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4870 words

Citation: Williams, Robert W.. "Darkwater". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 26 September 2005 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=5758, accessed 21 November 2024.]

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William Edward Burghardt Du Bois, Darkwater

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