Literature
Baraka's Newest Tales
By Sidik Fofana--SeeingBlack.com Contributing Writer
Aug 15, 2007, 11:06

Tales of the Out & The Gone
Amiri Baraka
December 2006
Akashic Books

What is more of a pleasure—hearing Amiri Baraka or reading Amiri Baraka? For the last 20 years or so, it was difficult to answer that question. For reasons unknown, ten of his 12 Harper Collins titles have mysteriously gone out of print. (Some speculate that Baraka’s fiery revolutionary rhetoric was getting too much for major publishing.) In a sense, Baraka’s newest collection of short stories, Tales of the Out & the Gone, breaks a post-civil rights literary silence. A good bulk of Amiri Baraka’s short fiction is political rumination in disguise, yet, his most ardent supporters demand no less.

Tales of the Out & The Gone is vibrant and lively. Baraka has a very good ear for engaging prose and modern dialogue, which plays out in short stories like “Rhythm Travel,” a speculative fiction piece about the ability to disappear to wherever and whenever a given musical piece is played.

This book illustrates how Baraka has all but transcended the culture and customs of the 1960’s generation that produced him, making his literary persona all the more intriguing. Faithful readers of important writers such as Baraka often speculate about the life conditions that produce such literary talent. Baraka himself reveals that he was an avid science fiction reader. Although his admission accounts for his far-out ideas such as rhythm travel, it still does not speak to his tremendous wit exemplified in stories such as “Conrad Loomis & the Clothes Ray.” In this story, the protagonist comments on the difference between intelligence and “outtelligence.” The main character, Conrad, says, “Yeh, I made it up. But it existed always since it was in the world, scrambled up in the letters. Plus I’m sure some other outtelligences dug themselves before me.”

Baraka’s other stories exhibit more of this same youthful exuberance. His expert grasp of dialogue makes his fiction edgy yet grounded. The prose sounds is up-to-date without sounding likes he’s trying too hard to be young. The story, “Norman’s Date”, a secondhand account of a peculiar sexual encounter, reads like a timeless exchange between timeless bar buddies.

Maybe Baraka’s literary well can refresh the book world. The post-911 United States could use some of his progressive rhetoric that helped lubricate the Civil Rights and Black Power eras. (Baraka says he has at least four unpublished books that lay untouched by several publishers.) Tales of the Out & The Gone emphasizes Baraka’s focus on his articulated political plan to free America’s undermined classes. He has been able to speak his truth for the last few decades but now it’s very cool that we can finally see it in print again.

Discuss this article now on our message boards.


Sidik Fofana is a writer, poet, and emcee. He serves as associate editor at Allhiphop.com and is a regular contributor to the Source magazine. He graduated from Columbia University in 2005, with a B.A.in English. He currently lives in Harlem, NY.


© Copyright by SeeingBlack.com