The Undiscovered Paul Robeson: An Artist's Journey, 1898-1939 - Hardcover

Robeson Jr., Paul

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0471242659 ISBN 13: 9780471242659

Publisher: Trade Paper Press, 2001

Synopsis

The long-awaited, untold, inside story of the rise of the legendary actor, singer, scholar, and activist. The first volume of this major biography breaks new ground.

The greatest scholar-athlete-performing artist in U.S. history, Paul Robeson was one of the most compelling figures of the twentieth century.

Now his son, Paul Robeson Jr., traces the dramatic arc of his rise to fame, painting a definitive picture of Paul Robeson's formative years. His father was an escaped slave; his mother, a descendent of freedmen; and his wife, the brilliant and ambitious Eslanda Cardozo Goode. With a law degree from Columbia University; a professional football career; title roles in Eugene O'Neill's plays and in Shakespeare's Othello; and a concert career in America and Europe, Robeson dominated his era.

This unprecedented biography reveals the depth of Robeson's cultural scholarship, explores the contradictions he bridged in his personal and political life, and describes his emergence as a symbol of the anticolonial and antifascist struggles. Filled with previously unpublished photographs and source materials from the private diaries and letters of Paul and Eslanda Robeson, this is the epic story of a forerunner who now stands as one of America's greatest heroes.

About this title

About the Author

PAUL ROBESON, Jr., is a freelance journalist, translator, and highly regarded lecturer on American and Russian history. He served as a personal aide to his father for over twenty years and has been a civil rights activist since the 1940s. He is the owner and archivist of the Paul Robeson and Eslanda Robeson Collection, which consists of over 50,000 items, including thousands of photographs and hundreds of audio recordings.

From the Back Cover

"Robeson . . . lives, overwhelmingly, in the hearts and minds of the people whom he touched, the people for whom he was an example, the people who gained from him the power to perceive and the courage to resist. It is not a sentimental question. He lived in our times, we live in his. . . . It is a matter of bearing witness to that force which moved among us." -James Baldwin

Paul Robeson was inarguably one of the most important figures of the twentieth century. As this unprecedented biography makes clear, the essential facts of his public life are near legendary. Actor, singer, scholar, and activist---- Robeson dominated his era. His father was an escaped slave; his mother, a descendent of distinguished freedmen. With a law degree from Columbia University, a professional football career, title roles in Eugene O'Neill's plays and in Shakespeare's Othello, and a concert and film career in America and Europe, Robeson redefined the black male image.

But an intensely private side to Robeson is now revealed in these pages. At last, we can know the whole man. Here is the intimate story of how the preacher's son emerged as a force of breathtaking courage, principle, and compassion. Haunted by childhood trauma and pitted against brutal racists, he battled against his enemies and his demons with a warrior's heart. Although his youth spanned the Harlem Renaissance and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan, he resisted politics for years. Flowering as an artist in Europe, he emerged as a fierce symbol of anticolonial and antifascist struggles around the world. This was the Paul Robeson who returned to New York as a pioneering superstar, ready to challenge America to keep its promise to his people.

The Undiscovered Paul Robeson sets out to explore the connection between the artist's soul and the passions that ruled it. Layering decades of personal conversations, extensive research, and rich insights with previously unpublished excerpts from the private diaries and letters of Paul and Eslanda Robeson, Paul Robeson, Jr., gives us a deeply felt and brilliantly conceived portrait of his father's defining struggles, triumphs, and humanity.

Paul Robeson was inarguably one of the most important figures of the twentieth century. As this unprecedented biography makes clear, the essential facts of his public life are near legendary. Actor, singer, scholar, and activist—— Robeson dominated his era. His father was an escaped slave; his mother, a descendent of distinguished freedmen. With a law degree from Columbia University, a professional football career, title roles in Eugene O’Neill’s plays and in Shakespeare’s Othello, and a concert and film career in America and Europe, Robeson redefined the black male image.

But an intensely private side to Robeson is now revealed in these pages. At last, we can know the whole man. Here is the intimate story of how the preacher’s son emerged as a force of breathtaking courage, principle, and compassion. Haunted by childhood trauma and pitted against brutal racists, he battled against his enemies and his demons with a warrior’s heart. Although his youth spanned the Harlem Renaissance and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan, he resisted politics for years. Flowering as an artist in Europe, he emerged as a fierce symbol of anticolonial and antifascist struggles around the world. This was the Paul Robeson who returned to New York as a pioneering superstar, ready to challenge America to keep its promise to his people.

The Undiscovered Paul Robeson sets out to explore the connection between the artist’s soul and the passions that ruled it. Layering decades of personal conversations, extensive research, and rich insights with previously unpublished excerpts from the private diaries and letters of Paul and Eslanda Robeson, Paul Robeson, Jr., gives us a deeply felt and brilliantly conceived portrait of his father’s defining struggles, triumphs, and humanity.

Reviews

Paul Robeson, one of the world's most famous actors from the 1920s through the 1950s and a man who led an extraordinary life by any measure, is not widely known today. In this moving and intimate memoir, his son, a freelance journalist and translator, blames his father's current obscurity on the public response to his outspoken left-wing politics and insistence on racial pride, evident throughout his careers in college sports, on stage and as a spokesperson for equal rights. Most pointedly at issue, in Robeson Jr.'s eyes, is the far-reaching, vituperative media campaign waged during the McCarthy era that (wrongly) labeled Robeson a Communist and caused him to be blacklisted from 1949 until his death in 1976. Born in 1898 to a runaway slave who became a famed minister and preacher, in 1915 Robeson was the third African-American admitted to Rutgers University, where, despite overt racism, he became a noted scholar, athlete and orator. After graduating from Columbia Law School, he tried his hand at the theater and, in 1924, was heralded for his performance in O'Neill's The Emperor Jones. Robeson went on to become an international star, notably playing Othello in London and appearing in the stage and film versions of the musical Show Boat. During this time, he also entered the political arena with his support of antifascist and leftist groups, later used by the press and anti-Communist witch-hunters to tarnish Robeson's reputation. Robeson Jr. writes forcefully of his parents' successes his mother, Eslanda, led a life as public as her husband's as well as of their troubled marriage. This version of his father's life is an important, well-wrought addition to African-American, Cold War and theater scholarship.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Paul Robeson is certainly one of the more tragic figures in 20th-century U.S. history. He was a gifted athlete, musician, scholar, actor, and activist who remained enamoured of Stalin long after others grew disillusioned. Now his son, owner and archivist for the Paul Robeson and Eslanda Robeson Collection, mines the collection's decades' worth of personal papers and diaries to explore the artist's intellectual development in the first of a proposed two-volume biography. Extensively illustrated with personal photos, this is a unique account of a brilliant but troubled man forced to seek the accolades he deserved in foreign lands. Often more anecdotal than analytical, this volume remains a necessary acquisition for all libraries and a welcome adjunct to Martin Duberman's definitive Paul Robeson: A Biography (LJ 1/89). Anthony J. Adam, Prairie View A&M Univ.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The great athlete, singer, actor, and activist's son offers an "intimate, informal biography" of him. Citing letters, diaries, speeches, news accounts, and personal records of his parents, the son recalls the struggles and glitter of his father's brilliant career, achieved by overcoming the racial restrictions of his lifetime. Paul Robeson (1898-1976) attained degrees from Rutgers University and Columbia Law School; success as a professional football player; acting success as Othello and the Emperor Jones, among many roles; and acclaim as a concert singer and film star in the U.S and Europe. Coming late to politics, he challenged racism and fascism and used his dignified stardom to change the image of black men and confront American political and social hypocrisy. Meanwhile, his marriage was complicated, his son shows, by his wife's possessiveness and his own defiance of her attempted restrictions. His many years of being blacklisted for associating with Communists later eroded his fame. His son demonstrates how compelling a figure his gifted father could be. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Trade Paper Press
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0471242659
• ISBN 13: 9780471242659
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 400