Brown Girl, Brownstones (Penguin Vitae)

Brown Girl, Brownstones (Penguin Vitae)

A collectible hardcover edition of the beloved novel about a New York City girlhood that heralded a renaissance in Black women’s literature, with a new foreword by Nicole Dennis-Benn, the bestselling author of Patsy and Here Comes the Sun One of The New York Times Magazine’ s 25 Most Significant New York City Novels from the Last 100 Years A Penguin Vitae Edition Selina Boyce comes of age in 1940s New York as the daughter of two immigrants from Barbados: a free-spirited father she adores and who dreams of returning to his Caribbean island home, and a disciplined, hardworking mother she admires and who is determined to purchase their Brooklyn brownstone. When her father comes into an unexpected inheritance, Selina is torn between his nostalgia for the past and her mother’s ambition for the future, all while negotiating racism, sexuality, Depression-era poverty, and the competing values of African Americans and her West Indian immigrant community. First published in 1959, Brown Girl, Brownstones opened a window into the rich inner life of Black women and today ranks with A Tree Grows in Brooklyn as one of the great New York City novels. With her autobiographical debut, Paule Marshall paved the way for Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Audre Lorde, June Jordan, and Maya Angelou—and took her place in the American literary canon. Penguin Vitae—loosely translated as "Penguin of one's life"—is a deluxe hardcover series from Penguin Classics celebrating a dynamic and diverse landscape of classic fiction and nonfiction from seventy-five years of classics publishing. Penguin Vitae provides readers with beautifully designed classics that have shaped the course of their lives, and welcomes new readers to discover these literary gifts of personal inspiration, intellectual engagement, and creative originality. “Remarkable for its colorful characters, the cadence of its dialogue and its evocation of a still-lingering past.” — The New York Times Book Review “Marshall brings to her characters . . . an instinctive understanding, a generosity and free humor that combine to form a style remarkable for its courage, its color, and its natural control.” — The New Yorker “An unforgettable novel written with pride and anger, with rebellion and tears.” — New York Herald Tribune “Passionate, compelling . . . an impressive accomplishment.” — Saturday Review “[A] literary gem . . . Brown Girl, Brownstones is so affirming in its celebration of Caribbean culture that, reading it, I felt my lungs fill with my desire to create. . . . How many Black Caribbean girls, I wondered, had any idea that we could do this, that we could tell our own stories? . . . Paule Marshall brought Black Caribbean women to life in her books. . . . She did this with compassion and precision, masterfully capturing all the nuances of being Black, Caribbean, immigrant, woman. She did this, above all, with love. . . . In depicting a young girl carving out a place for herself in the world, Paule Marshall has carved out a place for herself in the literary canon.” — Nicole Dennis-Benn, from the Foreword Paule Marshall (1929–2019) was a MacArthur “genius,” a Guggenheim fellow, and the recipient of numerous other honors, including the American Book Award, the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature, and the Anisfield–Wolf Lifetime Achievement Award. A member of “the Sisterhood” of Black women writers that included Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, June Jordan, and Alice Walker, she published five novels— Brown Girl, Brownstones (1959); The Chosen Place, the Timeless People (1969); Praisesong for the Widow (1983); Daughters (1991); and The Fisher King (2001)—as well as a collection of novellas, Soul Clap Hands and Sing (1961); a short-story collection, Reena and Other Stories (1983); and a memoir, Triangular Road (2009). Born and raised in Brooklyn to parents from Barbados, she died in Richmond, Virginia. Nicole Dennis-Benn (foreword) is the author of the Read with Jenna Book Club pick Patsy , which was a national bestseller and a Lambda Literary Award winner, and Here Comes the Sun , which was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year and a Lambda Literary Award winner. Born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica, she teaches at Princeton and lives with her wife in Brooklyn, New York.