Negrophilia: Avant-Garde Paris and Black Culture in the 1920s (Interplay)

This book was assigned for a history class at UC Berkeley and have had a hard time keeping it in my flat because everyone borrows it. It has the most beautiful photos (Paul Colin, Archibald Motley, Gauguin, Picasso... there is a picture for every page), nice heavy paper with sheen, and great typeset. Don't let the title fool you, the book is not inflammatory, it is simply a great art book as well as an academically respected history book that is also fun for lay readers. I ended up purchasing a second copy because after the first chapter I regretted highlighting/underlining such a beautiful book. I wanted a nice pristine copy and and now I have extra copy to loan out. Le jazz hot fans, Josephine Baker aficionados, Art lovers of any race will adore this book.

This feels like an attempt to recycle an academic-sounding manuscript. Its got very few photos. Best thing about this book is its provocative cover. On of many very boring books about a topic that should not be.

Honest seller. Product exactly as promised. Great eBayer

Filled with information! it was a fascinating understanding of how African American (Black People) were such an influence on Music, Decor, Clothes at that time and still continue to do so.

i was disappointed by this book.the illustrations are very interesting and revealing of those times, but the text has the aura of an academic essay and lacks energy.the point, well made, that the embracing of "black" culture in the paris of the 1920s contained many elements of a patronising and implicitly racist european view, is laboured a little, and tends to overlay everything - it's a bit preachy and misses a lot out.for example, while talking at some length about josephine baker there is hardly anything reflecting her views on what was happening. i would like to have read some of her own personal observations of the parisian world she burst into.i wouldn't disagree with the central argument, but to me, the book felt dry and did not really reflect the spirit of those years, however flawed that spirit might have been.it is quite short also.