Table of Contents

Introduction by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. ix
Preface to the 2008 Edition xx
Prologue: A Prismatic Account of Some Important Matters 3
1 The Spirit of the Father
2 A Brief History
The Tale 17
Epilogue: An Epiphanic Conclusion of Some Important Matters 211

About the Author

The author holds a PhD in African-American Literature, Folklore, and Theory of Narrative from the University of California, Berkeley, and has published a number of novels, short stories, screenplays, and journal articles relating to African-American literature and life. His writings focus on the black man's search for respect and identity in a racist white society. An angry and provocative writer, Brown uses humor to inform his social protest. He has taught classes in literature and popular culture at UC Berkeley, the University of San Francisco, and other universities throughout California.

Foreword contributor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. is the Director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research and holder of the distinguished title of the Alphonse Fletcher, Jr. University Professor at Harvard University.

Reviews

“This is a book that turns you on; it tells you how it feels to be a young, black male American in a permissive society of white women.”
—Chester Himes, author of If He Hollers, Let Him Go

“Flimflamboyantly erotic ... audacious ... dramatic ... Mr. Brown is a born pornographer gone straight.”
—The New York Times

“Brown's best-selling The Life and Loves of Mr. Jiveass Nigger, published in 1969, [is] a picaresque novel ˆ la Henry Fielding's Tom Jones, infused with a Black Power sensibility.”
—Scott McLemee