“Charles Waddell Chestnutt: “(1858-1932) American novelist. Chestnutt, sometimes referred to as the first black American novelist, was a teacher, newspaperman, and lawyer. His first story, ‘The Goophered Grapevine,’ appeared in The Atlantic in 1887. His first book, The Conjure Woman (1899), centered on Uncle Julius McAdoo, a character with similarities to Joel Chandler Harris’s Uncle Remus. His later books dealt with race prejudice, the best known being The Wife of His Youth and Other Stories of the Color Line (1899). In 1928, Chestnutt received the Spingarn gold medal for his pioneer work in depicting the struggles of African Americans.”
Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.
Mark's Text Terminal 