Bigger and Blacker by Octavus Roy Cohen, First Edition, 1925

[African American] Cohen, Octavus Roy. Bigger and Blacker. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1925. First Edition Hardcover no Dust Jacket. 313 Pages. Measures 5.25" x 7.75". Contains eight short stories set among the black residents of Birmingham, Alabama in the early 20th century. Early Hollywood fiction collection concerning African American film-makers and actors of the Midnight Pictures Corporation. "This book deals with the successes and mishaps-mostly the latter-of various members of the Midnight Pictures Corporation, a moving pictures company of Negroes who made such excellent two-reel comic pictures in Birmingham, Alabama, that they were shown in over a hundred first run high grade houses through out the country".
Cohen (1891-1959) was a journalist and prolific author of fiction who published more than 60 novels and short-story collections, five plays, and 30 film scripts. He spent many years in Birmingham, Jefferson County, and his experiences inspired him to write short stories centering on African American life in the 1910s. Writing from a white man's perspective, however, Cohen's Birmingham stories contain racially biased stereotypes, humor, and language that drew criticism even at the time they were published. This first edition of Cohen's collection of short stories is bound in brown cloth boards, with black lettering and decorations. Tight binding & Unmarked text. In very good condition.