Hard times on a Southern chain gang / John L. Spivak ; new introduction by David A. Davis.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Spivak, John L. (John Louis), 1897-1981.

Contributor:

Davis, David A. (David Alexander), 1975-

Series:

Southern classics series

Standardized Title:

Georgia Nigger

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

African Americans--Fiction.

African Americans.

Chain gangs.

Chain gangs--Fiction.

Georgia--Fiction.

Georgia.

Genre:

Fiction.

Physical Description:

xxv, 283 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm.

Edition:

Paperback edition.

Place of Publication:

Columbia : University of South Carolina Press, 2012.

Summary:

Davis (English and southern studies, Mercer U.) presents John L. Spivak's novel Georgia Nigger (1932), along with an introduction to the novel in historical context, additional documents Spivak gathered during his investigation of the abuses of the Depression-era prison system, and b&w photos and reports of individuals on chain gangs. Drawing on Spivak's access to chain gangs through the Georgia Prison Commission, the novel fictionalizes and exposes the abuses of the institutionalized system of sharecropping, debt peonage, and exorbitant chain gang sentences that trapped many southern blacks in a cycle of labor exploitation. The novel describes how the son of black sharecroppers was released from a chain gang then re-arrested and bound over to a white planter as a peon. He escapes only to be arrested again as a vagrant and sentenced to another chain gang. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Notes:

"Originally published as the novel Georgia Nigger (1932)."

"...On the Chain Gang (reproduced in an appendix in this volume) ..."--Preface.

"Published in cooperation with the Institute for Southern Studies of the University of South Carolina."

ISBN:

1611170443

OCLC:

733228109

Publisher Number:

99947756038