Eric Walrond was one of the more important literary figures associated with the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. A protégé of Charles S. Johnson, the Urban League's national director of research and investigations and editor of Opportunity magazine, Walrond made an auspicious literary debut in 1926 with the publication of Tropic Death. Indeed the critical reception of this collection of ten stories rivaled that of Jean Toomer's Cane. Both works were regarded as examples of avant-garde writing. Even the conservative and socially minded critic W. E. B. Du Bois admitted that Tropic Death was "a human document of deep significance and great promise." The stories impressionistically record the cycles of life and death, cultural disorientation, racial conflict, imperialism, and economic hardship in the American tropics. Although Walrond published no other book-length literary works, he did publish short stories and journalistic sketches throughout the early and mid...