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The figure of the violent man in the African American imagination has a long history. He can be found in 19th-century bad man ballads like "Stagolee" and "John Hardy," as well as in the black convict recitations that influenced "gangsta" rap. "Born in a Mighty Bad Land" connects this figure with similar characters in African American fiction. Many writers -- McKay and Hurston in the Harlem Renaissance; Wright, Baldwin, and Ellison in the '40s and '50s; Himes in the '50s and '60s -- saw the "bad nigger" as an archetypal figure in the black imagination and psyche. "Blaxploitation" novels in the '70s made him a virtually mythical character. More recently, Mosley, Wideman, and Morrison have presented him as ghetto philosopher and cultural adventurer. Behind the folklore and fiction, many theories have been proposed to explain the source of the bad man's intra-racial violence. Jerry H. Bryant explores all of these elements in a wide-ranging and illuminating look at one of the most misunderstood figures in African American culture.

Contains 83 delightful new rhymes and poems. Teachers' notes provide suggestions for using rhymes to support learning across the curriculum. The rhymes and poems are linked and cross-referenced to popular themes. The rhymes will foster a love of rhythm and rhyme, create a sense of beat and rhythm and lay the foundations for understanding patterns in language, music and mathematics. Use and enjoy the rhymes and poems on their own or as a way of introducing new ideas and starting discussions.

The Poetics of American Song Lyrics is the first collection of academic essays that regards songs as literature and that identifies intersections between the literary histories of poems and songs. The essays by well-known poets and scholars including Pulitzer Prize winner Claudia Emerson, Peter Guralnick, Adam Bradley, David Kirby, Kevin Young, and many others, locate points of synthesis and separation so as to better understand both genres and their crafts. The essayists share a desire to write on lyrics in a way that moves beyond sociological, historical, and autobiographical approaches and explicates songs in relation to poetics. Unique to this volume, the essays focus not on a single genre but on folk, rap, hip hop, country, rock, indie, soul, and blues. The first section of the book provides a variety of perspectives on the poetic history and techniques within songs and poems, and the second section focuses on a few prominent American songwriters such as Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and Michael Stipe. Through conversational yet in-depth analyses of songs, the essays discuss sonnet forms, dramatic monologues, Modernism, ballads, blues poems, confessionalism, Language poetry, Keatsian odes, unreliable narrators, personas, poetic sequences, rhythm, rhyme, transcription methods, the writing process, and more. While the strategies of explication differ from essay to essay, the nexus of each piece is an unveiling of the poetic history and poetic techniques within songs.

Argues that Black literature cannot be characterized strictly as social realism, and offers a textual analysis of works by eighteenth- to twentieth-century Black writers.

James Abijah Brooks (1855-1944) was one of the four Great Captains in Texas Ranger history, others including Bill McDonald, John Hughes, and John Rogers. Over the years historians have referred to the captain as "John" Brooks, because he tended to sign with his initials, but also because W. W. Sterling's classic Trails and Trials of a Texas Ranger mistakenly named him as Captain John Brooks. Born and raised in Civil War-torn Kentucky, a reckless adventurer on the American and Texas frontier, and a quick-draw Texas Ranger captain who later turned in his six-shooter to serve as a county judge, Brooks's life reflects the raucous era of the late nineteenth and early twentieth-century American West. As a Texas Ranger, Brooks participated in the high profile events of his day, from the fence-cutting wars to the El Paso prizefight, from the Conner Fight--where he lost three fingers from his left hand--to the Temple rail strike, all with a resolute demeanor and a fast gun. A shoot-out in Indian Territory nearly cost him his life and then jeopardized his career, and a lifelong bout with old Kentucky bourbon did the same. With three other distinguished Ranger captains, Brooks witnessed and helped promote the transformation of the elite Frontier Battalion into the Ranger Force. As a state legislator, he brokered the creation of a South Texas county that bears his name today, and where he served for twenty-eight years as county judge. He was the quintessential enforcer of frontier justice, scars and all.

First published in 1965, this is the final installment of the Duke De Richleau series... The years have moved on, and De Richleau has relocated from his London pad to an apartment in the Mediterranean. His great friends visit on occasion, and on this one both Rex's son and Richard Eaton's daughter (first seen as a little girl in The Devil Rides Out), paving the way for a young romance to blossom amongst the action. But interwoven with the the story of love is a strange inheritance that draws the whole party to Sri Lanka, where they are destined to face theft, murder, arson and blackmail. De Richleau, at the eleventh hour, is forced to take a last desperate gamble, alone, to save his friends.

Down in the jungle where nobody goes, there is something very exciting going on! Find out by looking through the die-cut holes on each page, and join in with the well-loved song.

Javis and Simon were two previous adventures now combined into this book about their organization called the Untouchables. This group is dedicated to opposing crime but with a difference: it recognizes no laws. Named after the caste in India who perform dirty and dangerous jobs, the actions of the Untouchables are often illegal and lethal. Only one man, Mother Hen, knows the true identity of his agents, and, as outlaws, their only protection is their anonymity which they protect with disguises and false identities, enabling them to disappear after a mission like the "ghosts" they are called.