Significant works of all time periods and genres are represented, from Phyllis Wheatley's 1773 Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral to William Wells Brown's 1845 Clotel, the first novel by an African American, to Spike Lee's contemporary screenplay, Malcolm X.

"Published in association with the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture." Abridged version of: The Schomburg Center Guide to black literature from the eighteenth century to the present / Roger M. Valade III. Includes index.