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A review by iseefeelings
Selected Letters of Langston Hughes by Langston Hughes
3.0
✤"I always do as I want, preferring to kill myself in my own way rather than die of boredom trying to live according to somebody else's 'good advice'". // p.34
✦"I hate to be a professional quarreler, but what you guys on THE CRISIS do to poetry is a sin and a shame. You stick it off in far corners in a column next to the ads, and put it in small type that makes it harder than it naturally is to read, and you thus hurt the poets' souls. Poets like to be published in good spots, with lots of nice-looking margin around them that attracts the eye so somebody will look at what they have to say, otherwise they're likely not to get looked at at all..." //p.212
≈≈≈≈≈≈
Throughout this book, Langston Hughes appeared as a resilient person despite going through failure after failure to make a better living with his career, a great poet who mocked himself as nothing than a 'literary sharecropper', a simple man with a loving heart even though love from the loved ones were the only thing he couldn't get.
*
Even though I admire Hughes a great deal, I still skimmed so many pages and didn't find this book enjoyable.
I understand the purpose of these letters is to maintain relationships with his family members, peers, fans and acquaintances but most of the letters are for work and reveal very few details of his personal life (rarely any love letters as well). The book is fairly monotonous as compared with other writers' letters I've read so far. Regarding the effort of the publisher in curating and editing, I still consider it as a book worth reading for any fan of this literary icon.
✦"I hate to be a professional quarreler, but what you guys on THE CRISIS do to poetry is a sin and a shame. You stick it off in far corners in a column next to the ads, and put it in small type that makes it harder than it naturally is to read, and you thus hurt the poets' souls. Poets like to be published in good spots, with lots of nice-looking margin around them that attracts the eye so somebody will look at what they have to say, otherwise they're likely not to get looked at at all..." //p.212
≈≈≈≈≈≈
Throughout this book, Langston Hughes appeared as a resilient person despite going through failure after failure to make a better living with his career, a great poet who mocked himself as nothing than a 'literary sharecropper', a simple man with a loving heart even though love from the loved ones were the only thing he couldn't get.
*
Even though I admire Hughes a great deal, I still skimmed so many pages and didn't find this book enjoyable.
I understand the purpose of these letters is to maintain relationships with his family members, peers, fans and acquaintances but most of the letters are for work and reveal very few details of his personal life (rarely any love letters as well). The book is fairly monotonous as compared with other writers' letters I've read so far. Regarding the effort of the publisher in curating and editing, I still consider it as a book worth reading for any fan of this literary icon.