(CUNARD NANCY) Negro Anthology made by Nancy Cunard 1931 193

Sale 2204 - Lot 220

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Estimate: $ 4,000 - $ 6,000

(CUNARD, NANCY.) Negro Anthology, made by Nancy Cunard, 1931-1933. 855 pages. Profusely illustrated. Large, thick folio, original brown cloth, lettered in red on the upper cover and spine; re-cased with the original spine laid down; top edge darkened; a few damp-stains to the top edges of the final 7 leaves, bookplate of noted book collector and writer holbrook jackson on the front free end-paper. London: Wishart, 1934

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An extraordinarily ambitious work, with chapters dealing with virtually every aspect of the African in Africa, or the diaspora. Contributors include: Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Arthur A. Schomburg, W.E.B. Du Bois, Walter White, William Pickens, W.C. Handy, Countee Cullen, and scores of others. Nancy Cunard (1896-1965) writer, heiress and political activist, was born into the British upper class but strongly rejected those values, devoting much of her life to fighting racism and fascism. She became the muse and sometime patroness to some of the 20th century's most distinguished writers and artists, and shocked her mother and London high-society by openly living with her black lover, the musician Henry Crowder. Cunard wrote and published "Black Man, White Ladyship" essentially about Crowder, who contributed to the Anthology as well. Later in life, she suffered from mental illness, and died at age 69, weighing only 26 kilos, in the Hôpital Cochin, Paris. Rare. Reportedly most of the edition of one thousand copies was lost when the warehouse in London where the books were stored was struck by a bomb during the "Blitz." This copy belonged to the noted British writer, journalist and publisher, Holbrook Jackson (1874-1948), considered to be one of the most famous bibliophiles of the 20th century.