In 1926: living at the edge of time - Monoskop

498 NOTES TO PAGES 471-473
Gartenvororte und Negerquartiere, aber immer mit schon en Aussichten auf die
in der Tiefe ruhende Stadt ... niedereilt."
122. I quote from the fourteenth printing, January 1928. On the origins of
Nigger Heaven and its reception, especially among black intellectuals, see Bruce
Kellner, Carl Van Vechten and the Irreverent Decades (Norman, Okla., 1968),
esp. pp. 195-223. None of the book's critics seems to have questioned Van
Vechten's expertise regarding life in Harlem. But a number of influential black
writers, above all W. E. B. Du Bois, took offense at the title of the novel. Van
Vechten intended this title to be part of the black discourse which he tried to
imitate (in general, with remarkable success).
123. Nigger Heaven, pp. 41-42.
124. Ibid., pp. 55-56.
125. Ibid., p. 278.
126. Ibid., pp. 91-92. See also pp. 89-90: "She cherished an almost fanatic
faith in her race, a love for her people in themselves, and a fervent belief in their
possibilities. She admired all Negro characteristics and desired earnestly to
possess them. Somehow, so many of them, through no fault of her own, eluded
her. Was it because she was destined to become an old maid ... ? Savages!
Savages at heart! And she had lost her birthright, this primitive birthright which
was so valuable and important an asset, a birthright that all the civilized races
were struggling to get back to-this fact explained the art of Picasso or Stravinsky.
To be sure, she, too, felt this African beat-it completely aroused her
emotionally-but she was conscious of feeling it. This love of drums, of exciting
rhythms, this naive delight in glowing color-the color that exists only in
cloudless, tropical climes-this warm, sexual emotion, all these were hers only
through a mental understanding. With Olive these qualities were instinctive."