Like many other children of parents who immigrated to the U.S. to escape political oppression, Meltzer has a special appreciation for the guarantees of freedom inherent in the American social contract. Consequently, he is especially aware of the injustice of denying constitutionally mandated rights to any citizen. His biography of Langston Hughes resembles a historical record of the twentieth-century struggle against racial oppression in the United States, uniting Hughes's life as a poet with its inseparable complement—his life as a black American advocate for social justice and individual freedom. Meltzer discusses the racism that has cursed American society in a steady, reasonable tone, avoiding the hysteria of extremists on both sides of the issue while clearly demonstrating the costs of bigotry to all those involved.

Meltzer maintains that Hughes's poetry "voiced the condition of the black American. He listened closely and heard; he...