Ishmael Reed

Trapos sucios ofrece la posibilidad de leer en castellano la prosa ensayística de Ishmael Reed (1938). Activo durante la década de 1960 en los círculos neoyorquinos de vanguardia y profesor durante cuarenta años en la Universidad de Berkeley, este poeta, dramaturgo, editor y musico de ascendencia irlandesa, africana y cherokee, es reconocido como pionero del multiculturalismo, incluso antes de que el termino se popularizara, y creador de la corriente literaria neovudu.

Three slaves are on the run in the deep South, with their former master hot on their heels and the Civil War raging.One of them arms himself for a final showdown; one sells his body for pornographic movies; while the last, Raven Quickskill - hero, poet, heartbreaker - swigs champagne on a non-stop jumbo jet to Canada. Taking us on a wild ride through a nineteenth century littered with limousines, waterbeds and colour TVs, Flight to Canada is a surreal, madly funny satire on race in America.

Harlem, années 1920. PaPa LaBas, détective et sorcier « néo-houdouiste », est engagé dans une lutte contre l’Ordre de la Fleur de muraille. Les membres de ce mouvement suprémaciste veulent éradiquer

This powerful essay collection from an award-winning author takes a critical look at Americas history of racism and the battles fought through the years by Black Americans. African Americans have been at war with certain elements of the white population from the very beginning. Being Black in this hemisphere is a battle, and each day is one spent at the front. In this new collection of essays, his first since Airing Dirty Laundry (1993), Ishmael Reed explores the many forms that this homefront war has taken. His brilliant social criticism feints deftly among past and present, government and media, personal and political. From the author whose essay style has been compared to the punching power of boxers Mike Tyson and Muhammad Ali, this book is a series of fast, powerful jabs at Americas long tradition of racism. "Reed wears the mantle of Baldwin and Ellison like a high-powered Flip Wilson in drag." Baltimore Sun "Ishmael Reed is a genius." Terry McMillan "The sweep of his work has both grandeur and genius, and even when you disagree with him, he has you laughing, often at yourself. His always-provocative writing has humanity, humor, power, and vision. A true original." Jill Nelson

Novela del pluripremiado autor estadounidense Ishmael Reed, inédita en castellano. Después del Renacimiento de Harlem (Mumbo Jumbo) y de la Guerra de secesión (Vuelo a Canadá), Reed revisita otro tema clave de la cultura de EEUU desde una perspectiva afroamericana: la novela del lejano oeste y de la frontera. Pero en La caida de Yellow Back Radio el protagonista no es un bandido o un sheriff de un pueblo de Nevada sino Loop Garoo, un cowboy de circo afroamericano, heredero de las tradiciones magicas de su pueblo y practicante de HooDoo. El resultado es un continuo de situaciones absurdas e hilarantes en las que poco a poco se van descubriendo las contradicciones de la conquista del oeste y cuanto siguen influyendo aun hoy en dia la sociedad norteamericana.

Raven Quickskill se ha dado a la fuga. Ha escapado junto a 40s y Stray Leechfield de la plantación del amo Swillie. Dicen que han contraído la drapetomanía, una enfermedad mental que genera un irrefrenable deseo de libertad entre los esclavos. Ahora el amo Swillie los quiere de vuelta y para eso ha reclutado a los mejores rastreadores de Nebraska. El objetivo de Raven es llegar a Canadá, donde finalmente el amo no podrá alcanzarlo. Ambientada durante la guerra civil norteamericana, Pasaje a Canadá mezcla elementos típicos de la novela histórica con elementos característicos de la modernidad en un popurrí hilarante que al mismo tiempo reflexiona sobre una plaga todavía sangrante de la historia de EEUU.

Oakland is a blues city, brawling and husky . . .Often overshadowed by San Francisco, its twinkling sister city across the Bay, Oakland is itself an American wonder. The city is surrounded by and filled with natural beautymountains and hills and lakes and a bayand architecture that mirrors its history as a Spanish mission, Gold Rush outpost, and home of the Wests most devious robber barons. Its also a city of artists and blue-collar workers, the birthplace of the Black Panthers, neighbor to Berkeley, and home to a vibrant and volatile stew of immigrants and refugees.In Blues City, Ishmael Reed, one of our most brilliant essayists, takes us on a tour of Oakland, exploring its fascinating history, its beautiful hills and waterfronts, and its odd cultural juxtapositions. He takes us into a year in the life of this amazing city, to black cowboy parades and Indian powwows, to Black Panther reunions and Gay Pride concerts, to a Japanese jazz club where a Lakota musician plays Coltranes Naima. Reed provides a fascinating tour of an un-tamed, unruly western outpost set against the backdrop of political intrigues, ethnic rivalries, and a gentrification-obsessed mayor, opening our eyes not only to a singular city, but to a newly emerging America.

Deep in the American South, land of the hunted and the haunted, three young slaves have broken free. But they have their former master hot on their heels, and they must outrun, outwit, or outgun him and his personal CIA if they are to secure their freedom--all while dodging the bullets of the Civil War raging on around them. When the three men part ways, the adventure begins: the first buys up a huge number of arms in readiness for a final showdown; the second sells his body for pornographic flicks; while the third, Raven Quickskill, hero, poet, heartbreaker, swigs champagne on a non-stop jumbo jet to Canada. Flight to Canada is fun, pacey, adventurous, and touched by Reeds taste for the absurd. Reed takes us on a wild ride through a nineteenth-century Virginia that looks a lot like the West today, littered with everything from Xerox copiers to jumbo jets, and casts an unsettling sideways look at history, race and the American media.

Ishmael Reeds inspired comic fable of the ragtime era - hailed by Harold Bloom as one of the five hundred greatest books of the Western canonAmerica, 1920s. A plague is spreading, and its spreading fast, from New Orleans to Chicago to New York. Its an epidemic of freedom, joy and self-expression, being spread by Black artists, that makes anyone who catches it desperate to dance, sing, laugh and jive. Its the outbreak of Jazz, Ragtime and Blues onto the world scene; the spirit of Blackness overtaking America and the world. And its threatening to dismantle the whole social order. Working to root out the plague by any means possible - even murder - are the members of The Wallflower Order, an international conspiracy dedicated to puritanism and control. But, deep in the heart of Harlem, private eye and Vodun priest Papa LaBas is determined to defend his flourishing ancient culture against their insidious plans. And so, he finds himself locked in a race against the Order to find an ancient Egyptian text which might just be the key to keeping the virus of freedom alive.Caustic, badass, comic, Mumbo Jumbo is an exuberant explosion of magic, conspiracies, music and myth. Its a novel of outrage, intrigue, and wonder - an anarchic spiritual classic, and a satire for our times.

Sam Gilliam, artista afroamericano que vivió en la capital de Estados Unidos durante el auge del movimiento por los derechos civiles, abrió un camino con su singular visión artística. Gilliam surgió de la escena artistica de Washington, DC, a mediados de los años 60 con obras que trastocaron las normas y estilos artisticos establecidos.Las abstracciones liricas de Gilliam, incansablemente experimentales e inspiradas por el espiritu improvisado del jazz, adoptaron una variedad cada vez mayor de formas, estados de animo y materiales.Este libro, realizado en estrecha colaboracion con la Fundacion Sam Gilliam, es el primero en examinar exhaustivamente la amplitud de su extraordinaria carrera y presenta materiales de archivo nunca antes vistos y textos esclarecedores encargados recientemente que arrojan luz sobre el artista, su vida y su obra, junto con ejemplos del trabajo de Gilliam que abarca cinco decadas. Sam Gilliam (1933-2022) fue uno de los grandes innovadores de la pintura estadounidense de posguerra. Surgio en la escena de Washington DC a mediados de la decada de 1960 con obras que profundizaron y trastocaron el espiritu de la pintura de la Color School of painting.

PaPa LaBas es un doctor hudú y el responsable de la Katedral Mumbo Jumbo de Nueva York en los años veinte. La época del Renacimiento de Harlem, de las bandas callejeras, del racismo y de la guerra sucia de los Estados Unidos contra Haiti. Y tambien es la epoca del jazz, una nueva musica que lleva en si el germen del contagio de Jes Grew, una epidemia que obliga a la gente a bailar hasta el agotamiento. LaBas se ve involucrado en la busqueda del texto sagrado del Jes Grew, enfrentandose a la temible Orden del Cardo y al ultimo descendiente de los Templarios. Mumbo Jumbo es una novela hard-boiled satirica que deconstruye la civilizacion occidental y la analiza a traves de un cambio de perspectiva, poniendo la cultura afroamericana en el centrode la narracion.