Böcker av Keith E. Byerman

The Life and Work of John Edgar Wideman is ideal for readers who might not be familiar with Wideman's work or those who may have been intimidated by descriptions of his writings. Through its coverage of Wideman's life from several generations back to the present and explanations of how Wideman makes use of life experiences, this book breaks down barriers for new readers and enables them to better relate and connect to his writing. Author Keith E. Byerman discusses Wideman's book-length works of fiction and nonfiction, as well as some of his shorter, journalistic pieces. The book emphasizes how Wideman integrates family and personal experience into what is typically labeled postmodern writing, and explains how he has evolved as a public intellectual who supplies shrewd commentary on subjects such as the prison system, terrorism, and the role of sports in American society.

Byerman discusses how black writers such as Toni Morrison, Ishmael Reed, and Ernest Gaines have moved away from the ideological rigidity of the black arts movement that arose in the 1960s to create a more expressive, imaginative, and artistic fiction inspired by the example of Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man.

A a comprehensive reading of the work of W. E. B. Du Bois. Byerman examines the connections between the personal and intellectual aspects of Du Bois's life to reveal the intense engagement with moral and ideological issues found even in texts that Du Bois represented as "objective.

In the first critical biography of Clarence Major, Byerman traces his life and career from his complex family history in Georgia through his encounters with important literary and artistic figures in Chicago and New York to his present status as a respected writer, artist, teacher, and scholar living in California.