Ragged Revolutionaries: The Lumpenproletariat and African American Marxism in Depression-Era Literature

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN 978-1-61376-513-5

Cover design by Sally Nichols

Cover art: Charles Wilbert White (1918–1979), Untitled (Fight for Freedom), 1945. Tempera on board, 24 x 18 in. (67 x 45.7 cm). Montclair Art Museum. Museum purchase; prior gifts of Mr. and Mrs. Warren F. Van Thunen, the Estate of Francis Herbert Peaty, Mrs. Siegrfried Peierls, and Acquisition Fund, 1996.30.

Excerpts from Richard Wright’s letter of c. 1940 to Mike Gold and from Black Hope: Copyright © 2017 The Estate of Richard Wright. Reprinted by permission of John Hawkins & Associates, Inc., and the Estate of Richard Wright.

Quotations from Margaret Walker’s personal papers and letters to Richard Wright are used by permission of the Margaret Walker Center, Jackson State University.

Quotations from Ralph Ellison’s unpublished manuscripts and letters are used by permission of the Ralph and Fanny Ellison Charitable Trust.

Quotations from Stanley Edgar Hyman’s letter of 1942 to Ralph Ellison are used by permission of Phoebe Pettingell.

Material from chapter 3 was previously published in “Ralph Ellison’s Marxism: The Lumpenproletariat, the Folk, and the Revolution,” African American Review 47, no. 4 (Winter 2014): 537–54. Copyright © 2015 The Johns Hopkins University Press and St. Louis University.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Mills, Nathaniel, 1982– author.

Title: Ragged revolutionaries : the lumpenproletariat and African American

Marxism in Depression-era literature / Nathaniel Mills.

Description: Amherst : University of Massachusetts Press, 2017. | Includes

bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016059943| ISBN 9781625342799 (pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN

9781625342782 (hardcover : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: American literature—African American authors—History and

criticism. | American literature—20th century—History and criticism. |

Communism and literature—United States—History—20th century. |

Socialism and literature—United States—History—20th century. |

Marginality, Social in literature.

Classification: LCC PS153.N5 M557 2017 | DDC 810.9/896073—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016059943

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.