Harlem's New Negro vs. Chicago's New Negro

The first glaring difference in Chicago’s New Negro versus Alain Locke’s New Negro is how the two see the New Negro participating in the reinvention of the old to the new. Baldwin focuses on the working force and the “shift from white philanthropy to black metropolis.” He uses Jack Johnson and C.J. Walker as examples of black men and women becoming New Negroes through their acts. Jack Johnson defies the stereotypes and beats a white man in the boxing ring while C.J. Walker defies white businesses and starts a business that caters to black women. These two are examples of the New Negro that Baldwin describes but for Locke the New Negro is more artistic and focused on making contributions “in terms of artistic endowments and cultural contributions.” His description of a New Negro focuses on the product of thought and creativity more than the actions that these people take. Another difference that lies between these two are the central locations that the New Negroes inhabit. For Baldwin he sees it based in Chicago where the businesses are opening up and thriving but for Locke he sees Harlem as the “home of the Negro’s ‘Zionism.’” Locke sites the rise of black magazines and news articles as a reason along with the art and intellectual publications as a reason that Harlem is the center for the New Negro.

Although there are many differences between the two descriptions of the New Negro, there do exist some similarities. Baldwin believes that it is not only the consumer economy but also the “traditional intellectual spheres of church and academe” where conversations were started and new ideas were discussed where before they were silenced. He believes that not only were the consumer-centered ideas important but also worked alongside the artistic expressions. Locke ends his essay with the idea of a “spiritual Coming of Age.” I believe that this idea exists through both accounts of the New Negro not only in Harlem but also in Chicago. The end product becomes the same no matter what process was involved in the coming of age. 

The Warmth of Other Suns

White Houses

Your door is shut against my tightened face,

And I am sharp as steel with discontent;

But I possess the courage and the grace

To bear my anger proudly and unbent.

The pavement slabs burn loose beneath my feet,

And passion rends my vitals as I pass,

Where boldly shines your shuttered door of glass.

Oh I must search for wisdom every hour,

Deep in my wrathful bosom sore and raw,

And find it in the superhuman power

To hold me to the letter of your law!

Oh I must keep my heart inviolate-

Against the potent poison of your hate.

            -Claude McKay

This poem from The New Negro (pg. 134) by Claude McKay most closely resembles the struggle that Robert Joseph Pershing Foster faced in The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson. When driving from the South to California he attempts to find a hotel to rent just inside the New Mexico border and thinks to himself “he was free now, like a regular American” (Wilkerson, 206). Yet after being turned down by three different hotels where he needed to rent a room he realized that “he had driven more than fifteen hundred miles and things were no different” (210). Like in the poem, the doors were shut again and again in his face and there was nothing he could do but move on and attempt to find somewhere to sleep. At the last motel where he is denied service, the owners are from a Northern state and can understand his plea but still refuse service to him following the laws that are still enforced even in “free” states.  From here, Foster has to find it in himself to keep going even though he has not slept in almost 3 days. This is when he has to dig deep and find it in his heart to continue on. In the poem this is reflected in the “pavement slabs” and how they begin to burn beneath the feet. The “search for wisdom” in the poem can be seen as a search for Foster to find a kind soul who will house a black man for one night.  The wisdom will lie in one white hotel owner being able to see past the color of Foster’s skin and recognize him as a man and a fellow American. In the end, Foster makes it to San Diego where he gets a nights rest and than continues on to California. On his way he says that “‘It’s gonna be lucky for me in California. It’s gonna be good’” (216). In McKay’s poem the person had to guard their heart from the “potent poison” of the hate of others around them and by making himself believe it, Foster is making sure he is guarded from the hate that still exists within many even, in California.