Wallace Thurman: Cordelia the Crude

1. Wallace Thurman: Cordelia the Crude By: Casey Taylor Ms. H-B Per. 7 January 13, 2014

2. Wallace Thurman • Born: Aug. 16, 1902 in Salt Lake City, Utah • Profession: poet, playwright, novelist, newspaper editor/writer • Lauded as a satirist • Attended the University of Utah before transferring to the University of Southern California in Los Angeles (1922) • Published works: Harlem: A Forum of Negro Life (magazine), Harlem: A Melodrama of Negro Life in Harlem (play), The Blacker the Berry (novel), Infants of the Spring (novel), Fire!! (journal)

3. Cordelia the Crude • Cordelia was a potential prostitute – undisciplined, half-literate, defiant • Favorite place was the Roosevelt Theatre (close to home) • It showed the latest pictures, showed a vaudeville bill twice a week, and had the “most delightful physical contacts” • Cordelia was a “Harlem theatre chippie”, an inexpensive young female prostitute

4. 3 T’s • Theme: Prostitution in the Harlem Renaissance. A young girl named Cordelia would have rather been a prostitute instead of being with her family and going to school. • Tone: Comes from a man’s point of view. At first this man was all over Cordelia, playing her game the way she wanted. Toward the end of the night, instead of going home with her, he paid her two dollars and left. • Technique: Wallace Thurman chose to write this tale as a story rather than a poem. He uses imagery often and shows that young women with nothing going for them would resort to becoming prostitutes. Cordelia became a prostitute to defy her parents because they wanted to move from South Carolina to New York to live with their son; Cordelia had found love in South Carolina and her parents tore her away from that.

5. Thurman’s Contribution to the Harlem Renaissance (critical source) • Created Fire!! to address the issue of critics more interested in propaganda rather than art. • Addressed homosexuality, interracial prejudice, abortion and ethnic conflict between African Americans and Caribbean Americans in The Blacker the Berry. • Depicted the Renaissance itself in Infants of the Spring. • Challenged some of the original writers of the Harlem Renaissance with their portrayal of African Americans while seeking praise from white critics.