The Harlem Reader: A Celebration of New York's Most Famous Neighborhood, from the Renaissance Years to the 21st Century

Boyd, national editor at The Black World Today and history professor at the College of New Rochelle, has assembled a memorable""mosaic of impressions,"" as he states in the introduction, of""personal experiences, organizations, institutions, and the dramatic moments that are at the core of Harlem's ever-evolving history."" Drawing on a wealth of works from short story writers, song composers, essayists, poets and activists, Boyd charts Harlem's history chronologically--from notes Alexander Hamilton made circa 1802 about his""Home on the Grange"" in what was then rural Manhattan, to a short series of interviews Boyd conducted with contemporary Harlem leaders. Boyd ably combines jeremiads and odes. Among the former are James Baldwin's""Fifth Avenue Uptown: A Letter from Harlem,"" in which he describes a housing project that""hangs over the avenue like a monument to the folly, and the cowardice, of good intentions."" Malcolm X denounces police brutality""when Brother Hinton was attacked with night sticks,"" which cracked open his scalp. Ann Petry praises the respite the Junto Bar and Grill provided for the""young women coming home from work--dirty, tired, depressed,"" and Mayo Angelou cheers Fidel Castro, who stayed in Harlem's Theresa Hotel, while Sonia Sanchez evokes the days when she was one of the homegirls""who smiled and danced and kept our dresses down because everybody knew we were going to make something of our lives."" An insightful book that will undoubtedly find a place in many classrooms, it provides a textured overview of one of the world's most famous neighborhoods.