Home To Harlem

Home to Harlem was the first best-seller by an African-American. First printed by Harper and Brothers in 19278, the novel quickly went to subsequent printings. Jack Brown, a black soldier who deserts the Great War in France and returns to Home to Harlem in the novel. The city’s nightlife is full of temptation for Brown after the horrors of the Great War. The grit and grime and hardness of the industrial city are pitted against the idealism of rural life, while characters live the frustration of intellectual potential and aspiration limited by prejudiced circumstances.McKay was criticized for depicting stereotypes of lower-class blacks in the novel, while others celebrated what they considered realistic views of Harlem in the 1920s.

The first printing of Home to Harlem by Claude McKay was published by Harper and Brothers in 1928. The novel quickly went to subsequent printings. "First edition" stated on copyright page with code "A-C" indicating publication in January 1928.