Charles Johnson in context

by Linda F. Selzer

"In addition to 'Middle passage' (1990), Selzer focuses on three other novels: 'Faith and the good thing' (1974), 'Oxherding tale' (1982), and 'Dreamer' (1998). She shows how these works reflect Johnson's participation in the larger cultural projects of several significant but often overlooked groups -- young black philosophers who challenged the dominant Anglo-American empiricist tradition during the 1960s and 1970s; black Buddhists of the post-civil rights era who sought to translate an ancient religious practice into an African American idiom; and black public intellectuals who attempted to revive a cosmopolitan social ethic during the 1990s. The cultural histories of each of these groups, Selzer argues, provide important contexts for understanding Johnson's evolution as a novelist. In the academic experience of black students who entered philosophy programs during the turbulent 1960s, the spiritual concerns of black Buddhists who have only recently begun to speak more publicly abou