☞ REMEMBER: Amiable with Big Teeth

We are reposting this rare, festive photo of Claude McKay in celebration of the unpublished book called "Amiable with Big Teeth: A Novel of the Love Affair Between the Communists and the Poor Black Sheep of Harlem,” which is a satire which gives a glimpse of the some of the political issues uptown circa 1936.  The McKay Estate has approved releasing this novel and it should be on the bookshelves relatively soon: LINK 

 A photo from 1922 shows Jamaican-American writer and poet Claude McKay with fellow poet Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven in Greenwhich Village at a bohemian photo shoot.  McKay was a key figure in the Harlem Renaissance years and wrote the notable novel called Home to Harlem in 1928 which would describe the nightlife uptown in graphic detail for the first time.  The book would become a best seller but some activist such as W.E.B. Du Bois thought the novel only had a negative portrayal of black culture.  Other Harlem novels by Claude McKay included Harlem: Negro Metropolis and  Harlem Shadows.

January 10, 1922. New York. "McRay and Baroness v. Freytag." George Grantham Bain Collection via Shorpy