Infants of the Spring

by Wallace Thurman

  I await your answer. Ignoring me will not appreciably delay my coming. It is written

  Paul Arbian

  “But,” Stephen was completely bewildered, “is this a part of his novel?”

  “That’s what I thought when I first saw them. But Paul informed me, very haughtily I assure you, that they were copies of letters he had mailed over a month ago. I was too dumbfounded to speak.”

  “But … the audacity. He must be crazy.”

  “Not crazy, Steve … merely an illustration of my statement that the more intellectual and talented Negroes of my generation are among the most pathetic people in the world today.”

  XXI

  After Stephen’s unexpected visit and their long conversation together, Raymond seemed to have developed a new store of energy. For three days and nights, he had secluded himself in his room, and devoted all his time to the continuance of his novel. For three years it had remained a project. Now he was making rapid progress. The ease with which he could work once he set himself to it amazed him, and at the same time he was suspicious of this unexpected facility. Nevertheless, his novel was progressing, and he intended to let nothing check him.

  In line with this resolution, he insisted that Paul and Eustace hold their nightly gin parties without his presence, and they were also abjured to steer all company clear of his studio.

  Stephen had gone upstate on a tutoring job. Lucille had not been in evidence since the donation party, and Raymond had made no attempt to get in touch with her. There was no one else in whom he had any interest. Aline and Janet he had dismissed from his mind, although Eustace and Paul had spent an entire dinner hour telling him of their latest adventures. Both had now left Aline’s mother’s house and were being supported by some white man, whom Aline had met at a downtown motion picture theater. They had an apartment in which they entertained groups of young colored boys on the nights their white protector was not in evidence.

  Having withdrawn from every activity connected with Niggeratti Manor, Raymond had also forgotten that Dr. Parkes had promised to communicate with him, concerning some mysterious idea, and he was taken by surprise when Eustace came into the room one morning, bearing a letter from Dr. Parkes.

  “Well, I’m plucked,” Raymond exclaimed.

  “What’s the matter?” Eustace queried.

  “Will you listen to this?” He read the letter aloud.

  “My dear Raymond:

  I will be in New York on Thursday night. I want you to do me a favor. It seems to me that with the ever increasing number of younger Negro artists and intellectuals gathering in Harlem, some effort should be made to establish what well might become a distinguished salon. All of you engaged in creative work, should, I believe, welcome the chance to meet together once every fortnight, for the purpose of exchanging ideas and expressing and criticizing individual theories. This might prove to be both stimulating and profitable. And it might also bring into active being a concerted movement which would establish the younger Negro talent once and for all as a vital artistic force. With this in mind, I would appreciate your inviting as many of your colleagues as possible to your studio on Thursday evening. I will be there to preside. I hope you are intrigued by the idea and willing to coöperate. Please wire me your answer. Collect, of course.

  Very sincerely yours,

  Dr. A. L. Parkes.”

  “Are you any more good?” Raymond asked as he finished reading.

  “Sounds like a great idea,” Eustace replied enthusiastically.

  “It is great. Too great to miss,” Raymond acquiesced mischievously. “Come on, let’s get busy on the telephone.”

  —

  Thursday night came and so did the young hopefuls. The first to arrive was Sweetie May Carr. Sweetie May was a short story writer, more noted for her ribald wit and personal effervescence than for any actual literary work. She was a great favorite among those whites who went in for Negro prodigies. Mainly because she lived up to their conception of what a typical Negro should be. It seldom occurred to any of her patrons that she did this with tongue in cheek. Given a paleface audience, Sweetie May would launch forth into a saga of the little all-colored Mississippi town where she claimed to have been born. Her repertoire of tales was earthy, vulgar and funny. Her darkies always smiled through their tears, sang spirituals on the slightest provocation, and performed buck dances when they should have been working. Sweetie May was a master of southern dialect, and an able raconteur, but she was too indifferent to literary creation to transfer to paper that which she told so well. The intricacies of writing bored her, and her written work was for the most part turgid and unpolished. But Sweetie May knew her white folks.

  “It’s like this,” she had told Raymond. “I have to eat. I also wish to finish my education. Being a Negro writer these days is a racket and I’m going to make the most of it while it lasts. Sure I cut the fool. But I enjoy it, too. I don’t know a tinker’s damn about art. I care less about it. My ultimate ambition, as you know, is to become a gynecologist. And the only way I can live easily until I have the requisite training is to pose as a writer of potential ability. Voilai I get my tuition paid at Columbia. I rent an apartment and have all the furniture contributed by kind-hearted o’fays. I receive bundles of groceries from various sources several times a week … all accomplished by dropping a discreet hint during an evening’s festivities. I find queer places for whites to go in Harlem … out of the way primitive churches, sidestreet speakeasies. They fall for it. About twice a year I manage to sell a story. It is acclaimed. I am a genius in the making. Thank God for this Negro literary renaissanceë Long may it flourishë”

  Sweetie May was accompanied by two young girls, recently emigrated from Boston. They were the latest to be hailed as incipient immortals. Their names were Doris Westmore and Hazel Jamison. Doris wrote short stories. Hazel wrote poetry. Both had become known through a literary contest fostered by one of the leading Negro magazines. Raymond liked them more than he did most of the younger recruits to the movement. For one thing, they were characterized by a freshness and naïveté which he and his cronies had lost. And, surprisingly enough for Negro prodigies, they actually gave promise of possessing literary talent. He was most pleased to see them. He was also amused by their interest and excitement. A salonë A literary gatheringë It was one of the civilized institutions they had dreamed of finding in New York, one of the things they had longed and hoped for.

  As time passed, others came in. Tony Crews, smiling and self-effacing, a mischievous boy, grateful for the chance to slip away from the backwoods college he attended. Raymond had never been able to analyze this young poet. His work was interesting and unusual. It was also spotty. Spasmodically he gave promise of developing into a first rate poet. Already he had published two volumes, prematurely, Raymond thought. Both had been excessively praised by whites and universally damned by Negroes. Considering the nature of his work this was to be expected. The only unknown quantity was the poet himself. Would he or would he not fulfill the promise exemplified in some of his work? Raymond had no way of knowing and even an intimate friendship with Tony himself had failed to enlighten him. For Tony was the most close-mouthed and cagey individual Raymond had ever known when it came to personal matters. He fended off every attempt to probe into his inner self and did this with such an unconscious and naïve air that the prober soon came to one of two conclusions: Either Tony had no depth whatsoever, or else he was too deep for plumbing by ordinary mortals.

  DeWitt Clinton, the Negro poet laureate, was there, too, accompanied, as usual, by his fideles achates, David Holloway. David had been acclaimed the most handsome Negro in Harlem by a certain group of whites. He was in great demand by artists who wished to paint him. He had become a much touted romantic figure. In reality he was a fairly intelligent school teacher, quite circumspect in his habits, a rather timid beau, who imagined himself to be bored with life.

  Dr. Parkes finally arrived, accompanied by Carl Denny, the artist,
and Carl’s wife, Annette. Next to arrive was Cedric Williams, a West Indian, whose first book, a collection of short stories with a Caribbean background, in Raymond’s opinion, marked him as one of the three Negroes writing who actually had something to say, and also some concrete idea of style. Cedric was followed by Austin Brown, a portrait painter whom Raymond personally despised, a Dr. Manfred Trout, who practiced medicine and also wrote exceptionally good short stories, Glenn Madison, who was a Communist, and a long, lean professorial person, Allen Fenderson, who taught school and had ambitions to become a crusader modeled after W. E. B. Du Bois.

  The roster was now complete. There was an hour of small talk and drinking of mild cocktails in order to induce ease and allow the various guests to become acquainted and voluble. Finally, Dr. Parkes ensconced himself in Raymond’s favorite chair, where he could get a good view of all in the room, and clucked for order.

  Raymond observed the professor closely. Paul’s description never seemed more apt. He was a mother hen clucking at her chicks. Small, dapper, with sensitive features, graying hair, a dominating head, and restless hands and feet, he smiled benevolently at his brood. Then, in his best continental manner, which he had acquired during four years at European Universities, he began to speak.

  “You are,” he perorated, “the outstanding personalities in a new generation. On you depends the future of your race. You are not, as were your predecessors, concerned with donning armor, and clashing swords with the enemy in the public square. You are finding both an escape and a weapon in beauty, which beauty when created by you will cause the American white man to reëstimate the Negro’s value to his civilization, cause him to realize that the American black man is too valuable, too potential of utilitarian accomplishment, to be kept downtrodden and segregated.

  “Because of your concerted storming up Parnassus, new vistas will be spread open to the entire race. The Negro in the south will no more know peonage, Jim Crowism, or loss of the ballot, and the Negro everywhere in America will know complete freedom and equality.

  “But,” and here his voice took on a more serious tone, “to accomplish this, your pursuit of beauty must be vital and lasting. I am somewhat fearful of the decadent strain which seems to have filtered into most of your work. Oh, yes, I know you are children of the age and all that, but you must not, like your paleface contemporaries, wallow in the mire of post-Victorian license. You have too much at stake. You must have ideals. You should become … well, let me suggest your going back to your racial roots, and cultivating a healthy paganism based on African traditions.

  “For the moment that is all I wish to say. I now want you all to give expression to your own ideas. Perhaps we can reach a happy mean for guidance.”

  He cleared his throat and leaned contentedly back in his chair. No one said a word. Raymond was full of contradictions, which threatened to ooze forth despite his efforts to remain silent. But he knew that once the ooze began there would be no stopping the flood, and he was anxious to hear what some of the others might have to say.

  However, a glance at the rest of the people in the room assured him that most of them had not the slightest understanding of what had been said, nor any ideas on the subject, whatsoever. Once more Dr. Parkes clucked for discussion. No one ventured a word. Raymond could see that Cedric, like himself, was full of argument, and also like him, did not wish to appear contentious at such an early stage in the discussion. Tony winked at Raymond when he caught his eye, but the expression on his face was as inscrutable as ever. Sweetie May giggled behind her handkerchief. Paul amused himsef by sketching the various people in the room. The rest were blank.

  “Come, come, now,” Dr. Parkes urged somewhat impatiently, “Fm not to do all the talking. What have you to say, DeWitt?”

  All eyes sought out the so-called Negro poet laureate. For a moment he stirred uncomfortably in his chair, then in a high pitched, nasal voice proceeded to speak.

  “I think, Dr. Parkes, that you have said all there is to say. I agree with you. The young Negro artist must go back to his pagan heritage for inspiration and to the old masters for form.”

  Raymond could not suppress a snort. For DeWitt’s few words had given him a vivid mental picture of that poet’s creative hours— eyes on a page of Keats, fingers on typewriter, mind frantically conjuring African scenes. And there would of course be a Bible nearby.

  Paul had ceased being intent on his drawing long enough to hear “pagan heritage,” and when DeWitt finished he inquired inelegantly:

  “What old black pagan heritage?”

  DeWitt gasped, surprised and incredulous.

  “Why, from your ancestors.”

  “Which ones?” Paul pursued dumbly.

  “Your African ones, of course.” DeWitt’s voice was full of disdain.

  “What about the rest?”

  “What rest?” He was irritated now.

  “My German, English and Indian ancestors,” Paul answered willingly. “How can I go back to African ancestors when their blood is so diluted and their country and times so far away? I have no conscious affinity for them at all.”

  Dr. Parkes intervened: “I think you’ve missed the point, Paul.”

  “And I,” Raymond was surprised at the suddenness with which he joined in the argument, “think he has hit the nail right on the head. Is there really any reason why all Negro artists should consciously and deliberately dig into African soil for inspiration and material unless they actually wish to do so?”

  ”I don’t mean that. I mean you should develop your inherited spirit.”

  DeWitt beamed. The doctor had expressed his own hazy theory. Raymond was about to speak again, when Paul once more took the bit between his own teeth.

  “I ain’t got no African spirit.”

  Sweetie May giggled openly at this, as did Carl Denny’s wife, Annette. The rest looked appropriately sober, save for Tony, whose eyes continued to telegraph mischievously to Raymond. Dr. Parkes tried to squelch Paul with a frown. He should have known better.

  “I’m not an African,” the culprit continued. “I’m an American and a perfect product of the melting pot.”

  “That’s nothing to brag about.” Cedric spoke for the first time.

  “And I think you’re all on the wrong track.” All eyes were turned toward this new speaker, Allen Fenderson. “Dr. Du Bois has shown us the way. We must be militant fighters. We must not hide away in ivory towers and prate of beauty. We must fashion cudgels and bludgeons rather than sensitive plants. We must excoriate the white man, and make him grant us justice. We must fight for complete social and political and economic equality.”

  “What we ought to do,” Glenn Madison growled intensely, “is to join hands with the workers of the world and overthrow the present capitalistic régime. We are of the proletariat and must fight our battles allied with them, rather than singly and selfishly.”

  “All of us?” Raymond inquired quietly.

  “All of us who have a trace of manhood and are more interested in the rights of human beings than in gin parties and neurotic capitalists.”

  “I hope you’re squelched,” Paul stage whispered to Raymond.

  “And howë” Raymond laughed. Several joined in. Dr. Parkes spoke quickly to Fenderson, ignoring the remarks of the Communist.

  “But, Fenderson … this is a new generation and must make use of new weapons. Some of us will continue to fight in the old way, but there are other things to be considered, too. Remember, a beautiful sonnet can be as effectual, nay even more effectual, than a rigorous hymn of hate.”

  “The man who would understand and be moved by a hymn of hate would not bother to read your sonnet and, even if he did, he would not know what it was all about.”

  “I don’t agree. Your progress must be a boring in from the top, not a battle from the bottom. Convert the higher beings and the lower orders will automatically follow”

  “Spoken like a true capitalistic minion,” Glenn Madison muttered angrily.
/>
  Fenderson prepared to continue his argument, but be was forestalled by Cedric.

  “What does it matter,” he inquired diffidently, “what any of you do so long as you remain true to yourselves? There is no necessity for this movement becoming standardized. There is ample room for everyone to follow his own individual track. Dr. Parkes wants us all to go back to Africa and resurrect our pagan heritage, become atavistic. In this he is supported by Mr. Clinton. Fenderson here wants us all to be propagandists and yell at the top of our lungs at every conceivable injustice. Madison wants us all to take a cue from Leninism and fight the capitalistic bogey. Well … why not let each young hopeful choose his own path? Only in that way will anything at all be achieved.”

  “Which is just what I say,” Raymond smiled gratefully at Cedric. “One cannot make movements nor can one plot their course. When the work of a given number of individuals during a given period is looked at in retrospect, then one can identify a movement and evaluate its distinguishing characteristics. Individuality is what we should strive for. Let each seek his own salvation. To me, a wholesale flight back to Africa or a wholesale allegiance to Communism or a wholesale adherence to an antiquated and for the most part ridiculous propagandistic program are all equally futile and unintelligent.”

  Dr. Parkes gasped and sought for an answer. Cedric forestalled him.

  ”To talk of an African heritage among American Negroes is unintelligent. It is only in the West Indies that you can find direct descendents from African ancestors. Your primitive instincts among all but the extreme proletariat have been ironed out. You’re standardized Americans.”

  “Oh, no,” Carl Denny interrupted suddenly. “You’re wrong. It’s in our blood. It’s . . .” he fumbled for a word, “fixed. Why . . .” he stammered again, “remember Cullen’s poem, Heritage: