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New Perspectives on James Weldon Johnson's the Autobiography of An New Perspectives on James Weldon Johnson’s Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Colored Man This page intentionally left blank New Perspectives on James Weldon Johnson’s Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Colored Man Edited by Noelle Morrissette Th e University of Georgia Press ATHENS A Sarah Mills Hodge Fund Publication Th is publication is made possible in part through a grant from the Hodge Foundation in memory of its founder, Sarah Mills Hodge, who devoted her life to the relief and education of African Americans in Savannah, Georgia. © 2017 by the University of Georgia Press Athens, Georgia 30602 www .ugapress .org All rights reserved Set in 10/13 Kepler by Graphic Composition, Inc., Bogart, Georgia. Most University of Georgia Press titles are available from popular e-book vendors. Printed digitally Library of Congress Cataloging- in-Publication Data Names: Morrissette, Noelle editor. Title: New perspectives on James Weldon Johnson’s Th e autobiography of an ex-colored man / edited by Noelle Morrissette. Description: Athens : Th e University of Georgia Press, 2017. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifi ers: lccn 2016049000| isbn 9780820350974 (hard bound : alk. paper) | isbn 9780820350967 (e- book) Subjects: lcsh: Johnson, James Weldon, 1871– 1938. Autobiography of an ex-colored man. | African American men in literature. | Race in literature. Classifi cation: lcc ps3519.o2625 a9535 2017 | ddc 818/ .5209—dc23 lc record available at https:// lccn.loc .gov/ 2016049000 To Robert and Michele, Frank and Nancy, ancestors and family This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix INTRODUCTION Biography of an Author, Biography of a Text: James Weldon Johnson’s Ultimate American Work Noelle Morrissette 1 PART ONE CULTURES OF READING, CULTURES OF WRITING: CANONS AND AUTHENTICITY “Stepping across the Confi nes of Language and Race”: Brander Matthews, James Weldon Johnson, and Racial Cosmopolitanism Lawrence J. Oliver 23 How Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Colored Man Became an Unlikely Literary Classic Michael Nowlin 41 Authenticity and Transparency in Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Colored Man Jeff Karem 64 PART TWO RELATIONAL TROPES: TRANSNATIONALISM, FUTURITY, AND THE EX- COLORED MAN Th e Futurity of Miscegenation: James Weldon Johnson’s Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Colored Man and Pauline Hopkins’s Of One Blood Diana Paulin 87 Blackness Written, Erased, Rewritten: James Weldon Johnson, Teju Cole, and the Palimpsest of Modernity Daphne Lamothe 112 Dead Ambitions and Repeated Interruptions: Economies of Race and Temporality in Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Coloured Man Bruce Barnhart 128 vii PART THREE POETICS: SOUND, AFFECT, AND THE ARCHIVE Th e Autobiography as Ars Poetica: Satire and Rhythmic Exegesis in “Saint Peter Relates an Incident” Ben Glaser 147 Th e Composer versus the “Perfessor”: Writing Race and (Rag)Time Lori Brooks 169 James Weldon Johnson’s Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Colored Man, Archived and Live Noelle Morrissette 189 PART FOUR LEGACIES W. E. B. Du Bois, Barack Obama, and the Search for Race: School House Blues Robert B. Stepto 213 AFTERWORD Th e Ex- Colored Man for a New Century Noelle Morrissette and Amritjit Singh 230 SUGGESTED FURTHER READING 239 CONTRIBUTORS 243 INDEX 245 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am thankful to the contributors to this collection who, through their distinct lines of critical inquiry, have taught me new things about James Weldon Johnson, his writing, and our shared endeavors as schol- ars, authors, and educators. Our work in this volume rests on the rigorous and lasting scholarship of too many authors to name. All of our eff orts are indica- tive of a collaboration that honors Johnson’s scholarly and creative legacy and his deep regard for African American culture. Together we acknowledge the “black and unknown bards” and the placement of African American literature in America and the world. Several colleagues, particularly Robert Stepto and Louise Bernard, encour- aged me to bring together this collection. Robert’s critical legacy has inspired and guided my work; his friendship has sustained me. Louise helped shape the critical vision of this collection and has off ered her support at every stage. Keen critical feedback from my colleagues at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro helped me see the way through this endeavor. Karen Kilcup, friend and mentor, guided me as I assumed the challenging role of editor, patiently providing advice about the numerous and nuanced editorial decisions involved in a collaborative critical anthology. María Carla Sánchez, Karen Weyler, Ana Hontanilla, Hepzibah Roskelly, and Mary Ellis Gibson provided perceptive criticism and a supportive audience. I have presented portions of this work at the American Literature Association, on a panel addressing practices of African American biography with Emily Bernard, Carla Kaplan, and Louise Bernard; and at a symposium at Yale University honoring Stepto’s teaching and scholarship. Support from the Marc C. Friedlaender Faculty Excellence Award from the Department of English at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro helped me complete this book. Special thanks go to Sue Williams for her sup- port of this project. A work such as this is the product of the labors of many. I would like to thank the University of Georgia Press, particularly Walter Biggins, who embraced this project from the start. Jon Davies, assistant director for EDP at the press, and Merryl A. Sloane, our copyeditor, provided keen editorial insight to bring this book into its best, most readable form. Any errors that remain are entirely my own. I gratefully acknowledge the University of Minnesota Press for permission to publish a modifi ed version of Diana Paulin’s “Th e Futurity of Miscegena- ix tion,” from her monograph Imperfect Unions, and Harvard University Press for permission to publish Robert Stepto’s “W. E. B. Du Bois, Barack Obama, and the Search for Race: School House Blues,” the second of his W. E. B. Du Bois lectures from A Home Elsewhere: Reading African American Classics in the Age of Obama (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press), Copyright © 2010 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. I also acknowledge the Univer- sity of Iowa Press, which published my James Weldon Johnson’s Modern Sound- scapes (2013). Th e James Weldon Johnson and Grace Nail Johnson Papers in Yale University’s Collection of American Literature at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library are cited frequently in this book. I thank the Beinecke staff and Nancy Kuhl, the curator of the collection. In memoriam: Joseph T. Skerrett Jr. (1943– 2015) x Acknowledgments New Perspectives on James Weldon Johnson’s Th e Autobiography of an Ex- Colored Man This page intentionally left blank INTRODUCTION Biography of an Author, Biography of a Text James Weldon Johnson’s Ultimate American Work NOELLE MORRISSETTE It seems probable that, instead of developing them independently to the utmost, the Negro will fuse his qualities with those of the other groups in the making of the ultimate American people; and that he will add a tint to America’s complexion and put a perceptible permanent wave in America’s hair. —James Weldon Johnson, Along Th is Way When James Weldon Johnson wrote these words, he pos- sessed not only the hindsight of sixty- two years in America but a carefully considered knowledge of centuries of New World blacks. His knowledge was familial and represented an expansive geography, based on his mother’s Baha- mian and Haitian heritage and his father’s experiences as a free black man in Virginia who worked at hotels for wintering vacationers in Florida and had family in New York City. Johnson’s knowledge was personal, based on his expe- riences with Jim Crow and with the geographic, linguistic, and visual diversity of New World black cultures: Cuban itinerant workers in Jacksonville and boy- hood friendships with other young black men, including a Cuban exchange student (Ricardo Rodriguez) and the impetuous Judson Douglas Wetmore, who was light enough to pass. Johnson’s knowledge also was scholarly and multilingual: he had fi nished his detailed historical and sociological account of black New York, which broadly extended to world citizenship rights for African Americans, in Black Manhattan (1930) just three years prior to this refl ection, and he had translated into English poems by the Cuban Plácido as well as petitions for just treatment made by Haitians under U.S. occupation. In his “real” autobiography, Along Th is Way, Johnson wrote from a hard- earned status, having devoted his life to making sure America dealt with “the Negro” “right and righteously,” making this case through his high- profi le engagement in many of the National Association for the Advancement of 1 Colored People’s most celebrated causes for racial justice: the Silent Protest Parade marking the racial atrocity of the East St. Louis riots (1917), the Dyer Anti- Lynching Bill (1918– 22), and the Ossian Sweet case challenging restric- tive real estate covenants (1925– 26). “If the Negro is made to fail, America fails with him,” Johnson wrote.1 Serving as fi eld secretary, secretary, and executive secretary in ascending order within the ranks of the naacp, Johnson deeply shaped that institution’s endeavors, correctly viewing racial diplomacy as cru- cial in a segregated nation largely ignorant of its African American citizens. Johnson paired his role as a domestic diplomat—who constantly invoked a national conscience in matters of Jim Crow segregation and
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