Connecting Chapter 23 and 24

2. The Interwar Period
• Today we will look at:
• The Harlem Renaissance
• Videos
• Readings
• Art
• Major Figures: Freud and Einstein
• A discussion of Modernism
• Hear about the Reactionary 20s chapter from the author.
• Next time we will:
• Examine the Great Depression
• Talk about the New Deal

3. The Harlem Renaissance
• Intro Video
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkTVYtjKiF8
• Langston Hughes
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ir0URpI9nKQ

4. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
The Heart of a Woman - GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON
The heart of a woman goes forth with the dawn,
As a lone bird, soft winging, so restlessly on,
Afar o’er life’s turrets and vales does it roam
In the wake of those echoes the heart calls home.
The heart of a woman falls back with the night,
And enters some alien cage in its plight,
And tries to forget it has dreamed of the stars
While it breaks, breaks, breaks on the sheltering bars.
-1918
The Heart of a Woman and Other Poems (The Cornhill Company, 1918)

5. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
The Heart of a Woman - GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON
The heart of a woman goes forth with the dawn,
As a lone bird, soft winging, so restlessly on,
Afar o’er life’s turrets and vales does it roam
In the wake of those echoes the heart calls home.
The heart of a woman falls back with the night,
And enters some alien cage in its plight,
And tries to forget it has dreamed of the stars
While it breaks, breaks, breaks on the sheltering bars.
-1918
The Heart of a Woman and Other Poems (The Cornhill Company, 1918)

6. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
Georgia Douglas Johnson
Born in Atlanta. Worked as a teacher and principle until 1902, then
studied music (Violin) at the Oberlin Conservatory in Ohio. Married a
prominent Republican lawyer, who was appointed to a position in
Washington, DC by Pres. Taft. He did not support her writing or music,
and wished her to be a homemaker (the previous poem is dedicated to
him). After his death, she worked clerical jobs to support herself,
became more famous for writing (poems and plays), and began having
a weekly Salon in her house where many of the prominent figures in
the Harlem Renaissance would come when in DC. These continued for
40 years. From 1926-1932 she had a weekly column that appeared in at
least 20 newspapers nationwide.

7. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
Common Dust
- GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON
And who shall separate the dust
What later we shall be:
Whose keen discerning eye will scan
And solve the mystery?
The high, the low, the rich, the poor,
The black, the white, the red,
And all the chromatique between,
Of whom shall it be said:
Here lies the dust of Africa;
Here are the sons of Rome;
Here lies the one unlabelled,
The world at large his home!
Can one then separate the dust?
Will mankind lie apart,
When life has settled back again
The same as from the start?
(Between 1920-1924)
How do the two poems by G. D. Johnson differ? What themes do they contain, present?

8. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
America
-CLAUDE MCKAY
Although she feeds me bread of bitterness,
And sinks into my throat her tiger’s tooth,
Stealing my breath of life, I will confess
I love this cultured hell that tests my youth.
Her vigor flows like tides into my blood,
Giving me strength erect against her hate,
Her bigness sweeps my being like a flood.
Yet, as a rebel fronts a king in state,
I stand within her walls with not a shred
Of terror, malice, not a word of jeer.
Darkly I gaze into the days ahead,
And see her might and granite wonders there,
Beneath the touch of Time’s unerring hand,
Like priceless treasures sinking in the sand.
-1921
Liberator (The Library of America, 1921)
What themes are in this poem? Is there hope for the
future? What do you think McKay is trying to convey?

9. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
Claude McKay
Born in Jamaica, came to the US in 1912 to study at the Tuskegee
Institute. Disliked the intense racism in the South and the militaristic
form of education at Tuskegee, so he transferred to Kansas State
University. While there he was exposed to a number of prominent
African-American writers, decided he did not want to study agriculture,
and moved to NYC. He was a radical socialist and atheist for most of his
life. He travelled extensively, including to the newly formed Soviet
Union, where he spoke and wrote about life for African-Americans in
the US to communist audiences. Wrote poetry, books, and served as an
editor for publications during the Harlem Ren. Even published a book in
the Soviet Union, in Russian which was not translated until long after
his death.

10. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
No Images
-WILLIAM WARING CUNEY
She does not know
her beauty,
she thinks her brown body
has no glory.
If she could dance
naked
under palm trees
and see her image in the river,
she would know.
But there are no palm trees
on the street,
and dish water gives back
no images.
-1926 This poem is one of the best known and widely published
from the Harlem Ren. Why do you think that might be?
What themes are in this poem?

11. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Poetry
William Waring Cuney
Born in DC, graduated from Lincoln University in Pennsylvania where he
was a classmate of Langston Hughes. They would later edit publications
together and remained friends. Like Georgia Douglas, he also studied
music, both in Boston and Rome (he sang, but never became a
professional singer). Because of his love of music his poems are often
characterized by a musical rhythm, and many of them have been set to
music an sung – most famously by Nina Simone.

12. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Art
The Crucifixtion(1927)
Charleston(1928)
– Aaron Douglas
What do you notice
about these paintings?
What themes are
present?

13. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Art
Aaron Douglas
From Topeka, KS. He later graduated from U of Nebraska and
became a HS art teacher in KCMO. It was his dream to quit
teaching and move to Paris (as many aspiring artists did). He
stopped on his way to Paris in Harlem, and was convinced to stay.
He is best known for illustrating many publications from the
Harlem Ren. and for his style, which both exemplifies the
modernist style, and African-American themes. He has painted
many murals around the country, and later became the Chair of
the Art department at Fisk University in Nashville, TN. (and yes, he
did achieve his dream, and in the early 1930s he did live in Paris for
a year)

14. For Reference: Thomas Hart Benton
• New York, Early Twenties
(Madison Square Park, 1920-24)
• From Missouri
• American Modernism,
Regionalism
• Later mentored Jackson Pollock
• What are some of the
similarities between this
painting and those by Aaron
Douglas?

15. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Photography
James Van Der Zee
Couple in Raccoon Coats (1932)
Eve’s Daughter (1920)

16. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Photography
James Van Der Zee
Queue in Harlem (1927)
Strolling (1925)

17. The Harlem Renaissance – Examples of Photography
James Van Der Zee
Born in Lenox, Mass. Moved to Harlem as a young man. Began taking
photos as a teen, and developing them in an improvised darkroom in his
house. Later opened a portrait studio on West 125th in Harlem. His work
is best known for chronicling and highlighting African-American life in
NY (and later the US) in the 1920s and 1930s. He was important enough
at the time that he was commissioned to document the UNIA by Marcus
Garvey. His prominence was largely forgotten until the late 1960s, when
his work was “rediscovered” by another photographer creating an art
exhibit on Harlem in this period for the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The photographer had walked into his studio and asked if he still had
any pictures from then, only to be shocked when he produced boxes
and boxes of negatives. He was then made the centerpiece of the show.
He continued to work as a photographer until his death in 1983.

18. Major Ideas
• Sigmund Freud
• Psychoanalysis
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQaqXK7z9LM
• Albert Einstein
• Relativity
• Explaining the world through science
• Would later come to the US
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KyjQJBDD5V4

19. Modernism and Modernity
• What were the promises of modernity before WWI?
• How did World War I change how people felt about modernity?
• How do you think the ideas of Modernism changed after the war?
Political cartoon
highlighting the
presence of
advertising in the
modern world.

20. Chapter 24: In the words of the author
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFe6amZhFoA
• Now, every time you do the readings you will hear THIS voice in your
head…

21. Final Thoughts
• What do you think caused the Great Depression?
• For next time:
• Chapter 25
• We will start the Great Depression and the New Deal