For The New York Times, the best of these essays in addition to the novel put him "among the gods of America's literary Parnassus." A posthumous novel, Juneteenth, was published after being assembled from voluminous notes he left after his death.Įllison died of Pancreatic Cancer on April 16, 1994. He also wrote Shadow and Act (1964), a collection of political, social and critical essays, and Going to the Territory (1986). Ellison was best known for his novel Invisible Man, which won the National Book Award in 1953. He was born Ralph Waldo Ellison in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, named by his father after Ralph Waldo Emerson. With its publication, a giant world of literature has just grown twice as tall. Here is the master of American vernacular at the height of his powers, evoking the rhythms of jazz and gospel and ordinary speech.Īn extraordinary book, a work of staggering virtuosity. And behind it all lies a mystery: how did this chosen child become the man who would deny everything to achieve his goals? Bliss's history encompasses the joys of young southern boyhood bucolic days as a filmmaker, lovemaking in a field in the Oklahoma sun. As a young man, Sunraider was Bliss, an orphan taken in by Hickman and raised to be a preacher like himself. Tell me what happened while there's still time, demands the dying Senator Adam Sunraider to the itinerate preacher whom he calls Daddy Hickman.
Brilliantly crafted, moving, and wise, Juneteenth is the work of an American master. From the author of bestselling Invisible Man-the classic novel of African-American experience-this long-awaited second novel tells an evocative tale of a prodigal of the twentieth century.
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