20–21927
This is an English observer’s report on the condition of the negro in America today. He came to America to study the problem. He traveled south by way of Baltimore and Washington to Virginia, passed on to Georgia where he followed the track of Sherman’s march, went thru Alabama and Mississippi and to New Orleans and then followed the river north. He talked with negro workmen, preachers, teachers and doctors, visited their schools, churches and theaters, and he reports on lynching, the southern point of view, the effects of the war on the negro, etc., and writes of the world aspect of the problem. He finds that slavery left its taint on the white man as well as on the negro and says it is a mistake to view this American problem as exclusively a negro problem.
“The fact that in this book, as elsewhere, Mr Graham’s observations are more valuable than his reflections, does not detract from its simple, unescapable effect.”
+ Ath p615 N 5 ’20 570w
“Mr Graham has, with remarkable clearness of vision, analyzed our problem of race relations. He has fallen into error in a few instances, but the great bulk of his book is filled with a correct interpretation of the innermost thoughts and aspirations of twelve million Americans who seek to be free.” W. F. W.
+ Boston Transcript p8 F 2 ’21 1100w
“He saw nothing, of course, that informed Americans do not know already, but as an Englishman he saw from a new point of view, and ‘The soul of John Brown’ has the interest of a genuine freshness which Mr Graham’s mystical habits of thought and expression do not obscure.”
+ Nation 111:736 D 22 ’20 110w
“Mr Graham is an Englishman and may be forgiven for his mistakes in American history, except in the case of his opening chapter, which is lurid and dangerously misleading. It is entirely inconsistent with subsequent chapters.”