SOURCE: “A Tale of the Country Round: Jean Toomer's Legend, ‘Monrovia,’” in MELUS, Vol. 7, No. 2, Summer, 1980, pp. 37-46.

In the following essay, Rusch considers autobiographical aspects of the unpublished story, “Monrovia” and deems the story unique in Toomer's oeuvre.

From his unpublished autobiographies, we learn that, throughout much of his life, Jean Toomer (1894-1967) was unhappy, frustrated, and uncertain about where he belonged in the scheme of existence.¹ For a variety of reasons, most notably his mixed racial heritage and his somewhat chaotic and insecure childhood, Toomer seemed not to know who he was. Consequently, he spent much of his literary career trying to discover an identity through his writing.

In using the creative process as an important means toward gaining a strong sense of himself, Toomer recognized what most artists have recognized: the intimate and mysterious connection between the production of literature, or any art, and the...