Father and Son

A Vintage Shorts “Short Story Month” Selection
 
Colonel Norwood is the despotic owner of Big House Plantation, where he lives alone but for the occasional company of his black mistress, Coralee Lewis. But this summer, a new breeze is blowing in with the warm Georgia wind—his son is coming home.

From the publication of his first book in 1926, Langston Hughes was hailed as the poet laureate of black America. In “Father and Son,” Hughes reveals himself to be a writer of prose just as lasting as his poetry, and one of the true icons of modern American letters. The staggering final story in the collection The Ways of White Folks.

An eBook short.
“Langston Hughes is a titanic figure in 20th-century American literature . . . a powerful interpreter of the American experience.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer
Langston Hughes (1902–1967), a central figure of the Harlem Renaissance and one of the most influential and esteemed writers of the twentieth century, was born in Joplin, Missouri, and spent much of his childhood in Kansas before moving to Harlem. His first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, was published in 1926; its success helped him to win a scholarship to Lincoln University, in Pennsylvania, from which he received his B.A. in 1929 and an honorary Litt.D. in 1943. Among his other awards and honors were a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Rosenwald Fellowship, and a grant from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Hughes published more than thirty-five books, including works of poetry, short stories, novels, an autobiography, musicals, essays, and plays.

Angela Flournoy (introduction) was a finalist for the National Book Award for her debut novel, The Turner House. Her fiction has appeared in The Paris Review, and she has written for The New York TimesThe New Republic, and the Los Angeles Times. A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, Flournoy was raised by a mother from Los Angeles and a father from Detroit and now lives in Brooklyn. View titles by Langston Hughes

About

A Vintage Shorts “Short Story Month” Selection
 
Colonel Norwood is the despotic owner of Big House Plantation, where he lives alone but for the occasional company of his black mistress, Coralee Lewis. But this summer, a new breeze is blowing in with the warm Georgia wind—his son is coming home.

From the publication of his first book in 1926, Langston Hughes was hailed as the poet laureate of black America. In “Father and Son,” Hughes reveals himself to be a writer of prose just as lasting as his poetry, and one of the true icons of modern American letters. The staggering final story in the collection The Ways of White Folks.

An eBook short.

Reviews

“Langston Hughes is a titanic figure in 20th-century American literature . . . a powerful interpreter of the American experience.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer

Author

Langston Hughes (1902–1967), a central figure of the Harlem Renaissance and one of the most influential and esteemed writers of the twentieth century, was born in Joplin, Missouri, and spent much of his childhood in Kansas before moving to Harlem. His first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, was published in 1926; its success helped him to win a scholarship to Lincoln University, in Pennsylvania, from which he received his B.A. in 1929 and an honorary Litt.D. in 1943. Among his other awards and honors were a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Rosenwald Fellowship, and a grant from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Hughes published more than thirty-five books, including works of poetry, short stories, novels, an autobiography, musicals, essays, and plays.

Angela Flournoy (introduction) was a finalist for the National Book Award for her debut novel, The Turner House. Her fiction has appeared in The Paris Review, and she has written for The New York TimesThe New Republic, and the Los Angeles Times. A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, Flournoy was raised by a mother from Los Angeles and a father from Detroit and now lives in Brooklyn. View titles by Langston Hughes