James Weldon Johnson

James Weldon Johnson

1912 · Early 20th Century · Novel

The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, published anonymously in 1912 and republished under James Weldon Johnson's name in 1927, is a novel written in the form of a confession by a man of mixed race who has decided to live as white. The unnamed narrator grows up in Connecticut with his mother, a seamstress, and does not know that he is considered black until a teacher tells the class that he is not white.