“To Work Black Magic”: Richard Bruce Nugent’s Queer Anti-Fascist Insurrection

In this talk, PhD candidate Ryan Tracy will explore how Richard Bruce Nugent’s (1906-1987) refusal to give up homoerotic decadence in his literature and visual artwork posed critical problems for the “New Negro” Renaissance’s project of creating urgently needed representations of black masculinity. Nugent’s little-known short story from 1937, “Pope Pius the Only,” is no exception. As a response to Italy’s invasion of the sovereign African kingdom of Ethiopia in 1935, as well as to the ongoing lynching crisis in Jim Crow America, Nugent’s psychedelic story telescopes the global and historical scale of white supremacy, while insisting that a desire for “Latin” men and Roman culture can be part of the labor of black liberation.











When: Fri., Oct. 11, 2019 at 4:00 pm
Where: Graduate Center, CUNY
365 Fifth Ave.
212-817-7000
Price: Free
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In this talk, PhD candidate Ryan Tracy will explore how Richard Bruce Nugent’s (1906-1987) refusal to give up homoerotic decadence in his literature and visual artwork posed critical problems for the “New Negro” Renaissance’s project of creating urgently needed representations of black masculinity. Nugent’s little-known short story from 1937, “Pope Pius the Only,” is no exception. As a response to Italy’s invasion of the sovereign African kingdom of Ethiopia in 1935, as well as to the ongoing lynching crisis in Jim Crow America, Nugent’s psychedelic story telescopes the global and historical scale of white supremacy, while insisting that a desire for “Latin” men and Roman culture can be part of the labor of black liberation.

Buy tickets/get more info now