Triangular Road: A Memoir
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Hardcover: 192 pages
Publisher: Basic Civitas Books; First Edition edition (March 2, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0465013597
ISBN-13: 978-0465013593
Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches

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In Triangular Road, famed novelist Paule Marshall tells the story of her years as a fledgling young writer in the 1960s. A memoir of self-discovery, it also offers an affectionate tribute to the inimitable Langston Hughes, who entered Marshall's life during a crucial phase and introduced her to the world of European letters during a whirlwind tour of the continent funded by the State Department. In the course of her journeys to Europe, Barbados, and eventually Africa, Marshall comes to comprehend the historical enormity of the African diaspora, an understanding that fortifies her sense of purpose as a writer.

In this unflinchingly honest memoir, Paule Marshall offers an indelible portrait of a young black woman coming of age as a novelist in a literary world dominated by white men.

Brown Girl, Brownstones
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Paperback: 272 pages
Publisher: Dover Publications (January 15, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0486468321
ISBN-13: 978-0486468327
Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches

First novel by Paule Marshall, originally published in 1959. Somewhat autobiographical, this groundbreaking work describes the coming of age of Selina Boyce, a Caribbean-American girl in New York City in the mid-20th century. Although the book did not gain widespread recognition until it was reprinted in 1981, it was initially noted for its expressive dialogue. 'The Merriam-Webster Encyclopedia of Literature

Hailed by the Saturday Review as "passionate" and "compelling" and by The New Yorker as "remarkable for its courage," this 1959 coming-of-age story centers on the daughter of Barbadian immigrants living in Brooklyn during the Depression and World War II. A precursor to feminist literature, this novel was written by and about an African-American woman.

The Fisher King: A Novel
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Paperback: 224 pages
Publisher: Scribner; 1st Scribner Paperback Fiction Ed edition (September 25, 2001)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0684869705
ISBN-13: 978-0684869704
Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.3 x 0.5 inches

Read Chapter 1 from The Fisher King

In 1949, Sonny-Rett Payne, a jazz pianist, fled New York for Paris to escape both his family's disapproval of his music and the racism that shadowed his career. Now, decades later, his eight-year-old grandson is brought to Payne's old Brooklyn neighborhood to attend a memorial concert in his honor. The child's visit reveals the persistent family and community rivalries that drove his grandfather into exile.

The Fisher King -- a moving story of jazz, love, family conflict, and the artists' struggles in society -- offers hope in the healing and redemptive power of one memorable boy. 

Praisesong for the Widow
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Review
Throwing into suitcases all she brought with her on this Caribbean cruise, Avey Johnson knows she has to go home. She wonders why she has been dreaming of her childhood, of the months of August spent on a small island with her great-aunt. Were these dreams of the Shout Ring and her great-aunt's stories of the slave ships from Africa causing the knots in Avey's stomach? Then, forced to wait overnight in Grenada for the plane home, Avey loses herself in memories of her marriage. It had been a "successful" marriage, taking her from Harlem to Brooklyn to White Plains, New York. But now she feels that her and her late husband's financial gains were made at the cost of their history and passion for life.

The next morning, as she walks on the beach in a dream-like trance, emotionally drained from her night of memories, she encounters a man about to leave on his annual trip to his native island of Carriacou. His dancing the Juba dance triggers Avey's memories, and she is talked into going with him. On Carriacou, sixty-five-year-old Avey touches again the feelings of her family, her heritage, and comes to understand, in new ways, traditions she has long forgotten and the importance of knowing - and remembering - her past. 'From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Holly Smith

The Chosen Place, The Timeless People
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Paperback: 480 pages
Publisher: Vintage (September 12, 1984)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0394726332
ISBN-13: 978-0394726335
Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 1.1 inches

The chosen place is Bourneville, a remote, devastated part of a Caribbean island; the timeless people are its inhabitants--black, poor, inextricably linked to their past enslavement. When the advance team for an ambitious American research project arrives, the tense, ambivalent relationships that evolve ' between natives and foreigners, blacks and whites, haves and have-nots ' keenly dramatize the vicissitudes of power.

Reena and Other Stories: Including the Novella "Merle"
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Paperback: 224 pages
Publisher: The Feminist Press at CUNY (January 1, 1993)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0935312242
ISBN-13: 978-0935312249
Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches

This collection of Paule Marshall's short works illustrates the growth of a remarkable writer. Introducing the volume is Marshall's much-acclaimed autobiographical essay, 'From the Poets in the Kitchen," in which she pays homage to the hard-working, storytelling West Indian women who serve as her muses ' women who fought back against oppression and invisibility using the only weapon at their command: the spoken word. Such women appear in her luminous short stories, which travel from Brooklyn to Barbados and back again; and the title character of the novella "Merle' is one of the most memorable women in contemporary fiction.

Daughters
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Paperback: 416 pages
Publisher: Serpent's Tail (October 15, 2004)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1852427787
ISBN-13: 978-1852427788
Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 5.1 x 1.3 inches

Ursa Mackenzle is a black woman caught between two cultures - the USA and the Caribbean. Rejecting the lure of success, Ursa turns her back on a well-paid corporate research job and a stable, if loveless, relationship with a black academic. Instead, she seeks power and solace in her friendship with Viney. Remaining true to herself involves returning to Triunion, her Caribbean Island, where she is forced to confront the moral and political ambiguities that underpin the charisma of her father, a leading politician. With compassion and honesty, Paule Marshall shows how the past always intrudes on the present. For Ursa, this means accepting that her life in the United States is bound by events that took place a long time ago in another wing of the black Diaspora. 

Soul Clap Hands and Sing
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Paperback: 236 pages
Publisher: Howard University Press (August 1988)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0882581554
ISBN-13: 978-0882581552
Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches

'An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and   sing.'
'W. B. Yeats, 'Sailing to Byzantium'

The images summoned in Yeats's poem also inhabit the quartet of short stories in Paule Marshall's Soul Clap Hands and Sing.  In each, an aged man who has sacrificed human companionship to pursue fame, security, material possessions, or prestige comes face to face with his hollow existence and imminent death.  A dramatic confrontation precipitated by a young female character offers each of the four lonely men a chance to surmount his indifference or fear and inject greater meaning into his life before it is spent.  Named for their geographical settings'Brazil, Brooklyn, British Guiana and Barbados'each of these haunting vignettes forms a riveting existential commentary.  The insightful introduction to this edition of Marshall's novel, provided by literary scholar Darwin T. Turner, places the book squarely in the context of the times in which it was written.  The edition also includes an appendix of reviews that appeared when the book was first published in 1961.