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Comment on Defining American greatness: A’Lelia Bundles discusses ‘Joy Goddess, A’Lelia Walker and the Harlem Renaissance’ by Tabia
['Michael Henry Adams']
Comments for New York Amsterdam News
There was a full house at the Segal Theater of CUNY’s Graduate Center (Fifth Avenue at 34th Street) last Tuesday, for an illuminating discussion of A’Lelia Bundles’s latest book, “Joy Goddess, A’Lelia Walker and the Harlem Renaissance” (written with L’Alelia Perry Bundles).
Walker, A’Lelia Walker was dubbed by poet Langston Hughes the “joy goddess of Harlem’s 1920s.” Glamorous but down-to-earth, Walker was the author’s great-grandmother and namesake.
“Although Madame Walker was born after emancipation, her story was often reduced to a tale of from slavery and rags, to millions.
It was: ‘Madame Walker made the money and A’Lelia Walker spent it,’” Bundles said.
I was glad for Bundles’s answer: “I covered that earlier in my biography of Madame Walker.