Book cover of Black Nature: Four Centuries of African American Nature Poetry

Book description

This book presents the natural world seen through the eyes of black poets. ""Black Nature"" is the first anthology to focus on nature writing by African American poets, a genre that until now has not commonly been counted as one in which African American poets have participated. Black poets have…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Black Nature as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

This is an exciting and important poetry anthology.

Spanning the history of black poetry in America, the editor Camille T. Dungy has collected one hundred and eighty poems by ninety-three poets. Her introduction radically enlarges the realm of eco-poetry as she considers the exclusion of African-American poets from the nature poetry genre while also exploring the complexity of their relationship with the land that witnessed or abetted centuries of racist subjugation.

Thought-provoking essays by Alice Walker, Marilyn Nelson, and others, introduce each of the ten sections in which I found a treasure trove of poets I’ve long admired, such as…

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December on 5C4 by Adam Strassberg,

Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!

On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…

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