Racial identity and literary form in the modernist anthology
The Image and the Fire examines the coterie anthology—a small, outsider literary collection—as a key, yet understudied, instrument of literary intervention within American modernism. Whit Frazier Peterson argues that these anthologies, produced outside of institutional or canonical frameworks, served as deliberate challenges to dominant literary paradigms. Distinct from academic anthologies that helped codify the American literary canon, coterie anthologies were used by both white and Black avant-garde movements to disrupt prevailing cultural narratives and assert alternative literary visions.
Through close analysis of three seminal case studies—Des Imagistes, edited by Ezra Pound; Fire!!, a short-lived but groundbreaking magazine from the Harlem Renaissance, co-edited by Wallace Thurman; and Black Fire, compiled by Amiri Baraka and Larry Neal during the Black Arts Movement—Peterson traces a genealogy of the coterie anthology as a politically charged genre. He reveals how Black American writers and editors, particularly during the Harlem Renaissance and the Black Arts Movement, reappropriated and reconfigured this type of anthology format from white modernists.
Ultimately, The Image and the Fire positions the coterie anthology as a site of aesthetic and ideological contestation, one through which marginalized literary communities engaged in acts of cultural self-definition, canon revision, and formal innovation. By foregrounding the coterie anthology’s role in shaping a hybrid American modernism, Peterson contributes to ongoing conversations in literary studies around race, authorship, and the politics of literary form.
Arvustused
The Image and the Fire presents a number of compelling readings of its three main textual examplesDes Imagistes, Fire!!, and Black Fireas part of an engaging broader argument about the signifying chain Peterson perceives in these collections. The result is rewarding and quite striking. - John Young, author of The Roots of Cane: Jean Toomer and American Magazine Modernism
This book offers a fascinating exploration of the extended routes and roots of the Harlem Renaissance and Black Arts era, making it an essential resource for scholars studying the formation of literary movements. With its detailed analyses of anthologies and literary production, this book provides invaluable insights into the widespread circulation of Black literature, an essential read for scholars examining publishing and canon formation. - Howard Rambsy II, author of Bad Men: Creative Touchstones of Black Writers
List of Illustrations
Preface/Foreword
Introduction: Dichotomies and Collectives
Part I: Des Imagistes
1. Des Imagistes and the Birth of Modernity
2. The Secret Doctrine of the Image
Part II: Fire!!
3. Fire!! as Signifying Monkey
4. Country and City Folk Life: The Importance of Place in Fire!!
Part III: Black Fire
5. Conceptualizing Black Fire as Ritual Drama
6. Reading Black Fire as Ritual Drama
Conclusion: Canon Theory in the Twenty-first Century
Notes
Index
Whit Frazier Peterson is postdoctoral lecturer and research associate at the University of Stuttgart, in Germany. His work has appeared in American Studies, The Black Scholar, Black Perspectives, SiÉcles, and Callaloo.
