On a recent research visit to the Emily Dickinson museum and archives in Amherst, I chanced upon a most improbable discovery of forgotten, pioneering work by another titan of culture.
When thirty-one-year-old W.E.B. Du Bois(February 23, 1868–August 27, 1963) heard that the World’s Fair to be held in Paris in 1900 would include a special exhibition on the subject of sociology, he saw in it an opportunity to open the world’s eyes to what had been occupying him for nearly a decade — “the American Negro problem.” In The Autobiography of W.E.B. Dubois: A Soliloquy on Viewing My Life from the Last Decade of Its First Century (public library), he recounts:
I wanted to set down its aim and method in some outstanding way which would bring my work to notice by the thinking world.
[For more on this story by MARIA POPOVA, go to https://www.brainpickings.org/...-b-du-bois-diagrams/]
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