Introduction / James S. Mellis -- Conjure magic and supernaturalism in nineteenth-century African American narratives / Yvonne Chireau -- Rewriting conjure : routes of revision in Frederick Douglass, Shirley Graham, and Jewell Parker Rhodes / Carl Plasa -- Voodoo's circum-Atlantic alternatives in George Washington Cable's "The grandissimes : a story of Creole life" / Joseph E. Anderson -- Guiding myths : Zora Neale and her impact on Hoodoo and Voodoo scholarship / Jeffrey E. Anderson -- Conjuring history in Rudolph Fisher's "The conjure-man dies : a mystery tale of Dark Harlem" / Adrienne Johnson Gosselin -- The Hoodoo hustle : early twentieth-century African American literature, conjure and the 'con' game / Camille S. Alexander -- Kind of blue : race, religion and the place of Voodoo in Jean Toomer's poetics of catharsis / Andres Amitai -- Richard Wright and the black supernatural / Adam Nemmers -- The mumbo jumbo kathedral : Hoodoo and Voodoo in the 'work' of Ishmael Reed / Karen Joan Kohoutek -- Literary magic and spiritual empowerment in Ntozake Shange's "For colored girls and Sassafrass, Cypress, & Indigo : a novel" / Tammie Jenkins.
Summary:
From the earliest slave narratives to modern fiction by the likes of Colson Whitehead and Jesmyn Ward, African American authors have drawn on African spiritual practices as literary inspiration, and as a way to maintain a connection to Africa. This volume has collected new essays about the multiple ways African American authors have incorporated Voodoo, Hoodoo and Conjure in their work. Among the authors covered are Frederick Douglass, Shirley Graham, Jewell Parker Rhodes, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Wright, Ntozake Shange, Rudolph Fisher, Jean Toomer, and Ishmael Reed.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.