lauli's review
4.0
I came across this novel writing a paper on "Porgy and Bess", the opera based on it. Since I'd never heard it mentioned when I studied American literature, I wasn't expecting much, but was pleasantly surprised. The novel is gripping, the writing is very poetic and effective when it comes to describing the most dramatic, and the characters are well-rounded and human. Heyward truly deserves more credit than he's been given as a writer, especially for a very honest portrayal of the black community in Charleston, with its wonderful capacity for compassion, and its bonds of self-protection, as well as destructive features such as violence and gambling. His attempt to reproduce BEV is also praise-worthy.
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