New Orleans Griot: The Tom Dent Reader

✍ Scribed by Tom Dent

• Publisher: University of New Orleans Press
• Year: 2018
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 495
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

A mid-twentieth century African American writer and cultural activist, Tom Dent worked tirelessly to help cultivate the Black Arts Movement, mentoring numerous other artists and writers. Taken from his papers held at the Amistad Research Center in New Orleans, this vital collection brings together Dent's fiction, poetry, essays, interviews, and drama, including many previously unpublished works. With introductions by Kalamu ya Salaam, New Orleans Griot: A Tom Dent Reader showcases the remarkable life and writing of Tom Dent, from his early days in New York to working with the Free Southern Theatre in Mississippi to his astute observations of New Orleans and the black Mardi Gras Indians.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
Copyright Page
Title Page
Contents
Introduction
New York Years/Umbra Days
Like a Rumbling Underneath
Younger Generation Sad Representative of American Youth
[When They Finished]
Legacy of the Scottish Owner’s Will
Emotional Autobiography
UMBRA Days
Memorandum
Dave Brubeck
Dear Dr. Brayboy
Free Southern Theater/BLKARTSOUTH
Here we are dreaming while thinking we are wide awake
Dear Leroy and Big Daddy
Beyond Rhetoric
Black Arts Movement in the South
Ritual Murder
Song of Survival
New Orleans
Power to the Parade
St. Joseph Night
A Critical Look at Mardi Gras
Report from New Orleans
New Orleans Versus Atlanta
Griot Work
“trying to fight through the prison/of indifference”
Poetry
A Memoir of Mardi Gras 1968
Inner Peace: Slow Drag for Pavageau
Black Music in New Orleans
The Adventures of King Zulu
The Legacy of Paul Robeson
Jazz and Heritage Festival 1976
Southern Journeys Treatment
Annie Devine Remembers
Interviews
A broadening of our vision
Tom Dent Talking: New Orleans as a Resource of Genius
Umbra Days Interview/New York Days Interview
Enriching the Paper Trail
Afterword
Thomas C. Dent: A Preliminary Bibliography
Acknowledgements