49. Darwin Turner, The Wayward and the Seeking (Washington, D.C.: Howard University Press, 1980), 91. Toomer “formed and formulated” his racial position in the summer of 1914. This racial position is set forth in “Outline of an Autobiography,” which Toomer wrote, according to Darwin Turner, between 1931 and 1932. Toomer claims that as a student at the University of Wisconsin that he “had no use” for his racial position because the “question [of race] was never raised.” He contradicts himself here for in a later section of his autobiography he recounts the experience of having to contend with the campus rumor that he was a “Hindu” and an “Indian,” as well as the racism of a white male classmate. See pp. 95–96 of The Wayward and the Seeking.
50. The Wayward and the Seeking, 84.
51. Ibid., 84.
52. Ibid., 84.
53. Ibid., 85.
54. Ibid., 84.
55. Ibid., 85.
56. Ibid., 86.
57. Ibid., 93.
58. Ibid., 92.
59. Ibid., 93.
60. Jose Vasconcelos, The Cosmic Race: A Bilingual Edition (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997), 3.
61. Ibid., for Vasconcelos the terms “the ffth race,” “synthetic race,” “definitive race,” and “cosmic race” are fungible. The Cosmic Race 3, 7, 9, 18–19, 40.
62. Ibid., 20.
63. Ibid., 38.
64. Ibid., 35.
65. Ibid., 35.
66. Ibid., 39.
67. Ibid., 40.
68. In her article “‘A Small Man in Big Spaces’: The New Negro, the Mestizo, and Jean Toomer’s Southwestern Writing,” Emily Lutenski asserts “there is no clear evidence that Toomer used Vasconcelos as a source when studying the Southwest. Regardless, there are clear parallels between Toomer’s and Vasconcelos’ writings.” MELUS 33. 1 (Spring 2008) See this volume, p. 417.
69. This was translated as The Masters and the Slaves in 1946.
70. This was translated as Cuban Counterpoint? Tobacco and Sugar in 19 47.
71. Zora Neale Hurston, “How It Feels to Be Colored Me,” in I love myself when I am laughing…and then again when I am looking mean and impressive: A Zora Neale Hurston Reader, edited by Alice Walker, with an introduction by Mary Helen Washington (Old Westbury, NY: Feminist Press, 1979), 154.
72. W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Conservation of Races,” in W. E. B. Du Bois: Writings, ed. Nathan Huggins (New York: Library of America, 1986), 822.
73. David Levering Lewis, W. E. B. Du Bois: Biography of a Race (New York: Henry Holt & Company, 1993), 174.
74. W. E. B. Du Bois: Writings, 651.
75. The Wayward and the Seeking, 91.
76. Ibid., 93.
77. Ibid., 93.
78. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 69.
79. Ibid., 69.
80. Alfred Kreymborg, Our Singing Strength (New York: Coward-McCann, 1929), 575.
81. The Wayward and the Seeking, 111.
82. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 71.
83. The Wayward and the Seeking, 112.
84. Ibid., 113.
85. Leonard Harris and Charles Molesworth, Alain L. Locke: The Biography of a Philosopher (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2008), 171. Toomer’s correspondence with Georgia Douglas Johnson and Alain Locke reveals a level of familiarity absent in his autobiographical writings. For Toomer’s correspondence with Douglas Johnson and Locke, see The Letters of Jean Toomer, 1919–1924 (Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, 2006), edited by Mark Whalan. See also George Hutchinson’s “Jean Toomer and the ‘New Negroes of Washington,’” in American Literature 63 (December 1991).
86. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 94.
87. Alain L. Locke: The Biography of a Philosopher, 175.
88. Ibid., 175.
89. The Wayward and the Seeking, 114.
90. Ibid., 114.
91. The Wayward and the Seeking, 114.
92. Ibid., 114–15.
93. Ibid., 116.
94. Ibid., 116.
95. Ibid., 89.
96. Ibid., 23.
97. Ibid., 118.
98. Ibid., 117.
99. Ibid., 117.
100. Ibid., 117.
101. Ibid., 122.
102. Ibid., 122.
103. Ibid., 123.
104. Ibid., 123.
105. The history of the Sparta Agricultural and Industrial Institute and its founder, Linton Stephens Ingraham, is derived from online sources composed of articles from the Atlanta Constitution and the Augusta Chronicle assembled by Eileen B. McAdams (2005). Ingraham died on September 20, 1935, after which his wife, Anna Turner Ingraham, became principal. The institute eventually became L. H. Ingraham High School. In addition to these sources, we recommend the overview of Sparta, Georgia, that appears in Charles Scruggs and Lee Van-Demarr’s Jean Toomer and the Terror of American History (Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998), 8–32. We also recommend Barbara Foley’s “Jean Toomer’s Sparta” in American Literature 67.4 (December 1995).
106. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 81.
107. Jean Toomer, Natalie Mann, in The Wayward and the Seeking, 290.
108. Ibid., 57.
109. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 84.
110. Ibid., 84.
111. The Wayward and the Seeking, 123.
112. Jean Toomer, Cane, A Norton Critical Edition, ed. Darwin T. Turner (New York: Norton, 1988), 14.
113. Ibid., 14.
114. The Wayward and the Seeking, 123.
115. Ibid., 124.
116. Ibid., 124.
117. The Wayward and the Seeking, 125.
118. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 88.
119. Ibid., 88.
120. Ibid., 92.
121. Alain L. Locke: The Biography of a Philosopher, 173.
122. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 89.
123. Ibid., 89.
124. Ibid., 91.
125. Jean Toomer to Waldo Frank, December 12, 1922.
126. Jean Toomer to Waldo Frank, December 12, 1922, Norton Critical Edition of Cane (1988), 152.
127. The Wayward and the Seeking, 126.
128. Ibid., 126.
129. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 105.
130. The Wayward and the Seeking, 124.
131. Robert Littell, “Cane,” New Republic 37 (December 26, 1923): 126.
132. The Lives of Jean Toomer, 108.
133. Ibid., 108–09.
134. William Stanley Braithwaite, “The Negro in American Literature,” The New Negro, ed. Alain Locke. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1925; 1992), 44.
135. Arnold Rampersad, The Life of Langston Hughes Volume I: 1902–1941; I, Too, Sing America (New York: Oxford University Press), 152–53; Valerie Boyd, Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora Neale Hurston (New York: Scribner Books, 2003), 151; The Lives of Jean Toomer, 182.
136. Arna Bontemps, “Introduction,” Cane (New York: Harper & Row, 1923; 1969).
137. Darwin T. Turner, “Introduction,” Cane (New York: Boni & Liveright, 1975); Norton Critical Edition of Cane (1988), 133.