The secret book 🤫

About that other book I (re)published

I secretly published another book earlier this year, just for funzies. ‘Twas a journey that stretched my creativity, caused me to ponder my Blackness, and offered a case study of what happens when I hyperfixate. 😅

It all started over winter break last year. It was well past my normal bedtime, and I lay in bed reading one of the OG books on copywriting.

I was curious to learn what people thought about the book in the present day, so I made my way to the Amazon reviews. In the comments, people warned other readers not to buy this particular Kindle version of the book because it was riddled with typos. I learned the book was in the public domain.

This sparked a frenzy of Google searches.

What did it mean for a book to be in the public domain?
Who could publish books in the public domain?
What books were entering the public domain in 2023?

And that’s what introduced me to Langston Hughes’ second book of poetry, Fine Clothes to the Jew—more on that title later.

I couldn’t locate any modern reprints, and most original editions I found were hundreds of dollars.

So I set about bringing these poems, which are inspired by the blues, back to life as a standalone collection of poetry. It was a labor of love, which involved:

• Transcribing poems from photos and poetry databases

• Hunting down a beat up version of the original book on Etsy

• Realizing that many of the poems on the internet had been mis-transcribed and didn’t include the original spelling of some words, which changes the experience of the poems

• Having conversations with two of my Jewish friends about the original title

• Selecting two of Hughes’ essays to accompany the poems and to contextualize the collection in its time of publication

• Writing an essay contextualizing this work of poetry in the modern day

• Designing the front and back cover, which features an archival photograph of Langston Hughes taken around the same time he published Fine Clothes

• Creating 10 digital illustrations to go throughout the book.

• Stepping up my Adobe Illustrator game

• Formatting the book and getting it set up for distribution

If that sounds like a lot, it was. It’s also exactly the kind of project that I find enjoyable. There were point where I thought, “Did I just essentially write a college essay for fun? Yes, yes I did.”

This is The Process Report, but I’m not going to walk you through the ins and outs of each step. I’d rather share what completing this project allowed me to process.

Black-Jewish relations

I mentioned earlier that the book was originally titled Fine Clothes to the Jew. Here’s an excerpt from the essay I wrote as the preface to the book:

The original title made me squirm even as I read it at the tail end of 2022. It feels almost fated that this work would enter the public domain after the year we’ve had. A year when Kanye West threatened to go “death con 3” on Jewish people, Kyrie Irving tweeted a movie supporting extremist Black Hebrew Israelite ideology, and antisemitic incidents in the States are at an all-time high. 

Fine Clothes to the Jew references a line in Hughes’ poem, “Hard Luck.” And the line in the poem references a colloquialism used by Black folks at the time. When you were low on money, you’d take your best clothes to the pawnshop. Many of these shops in Harlem were owned by Jewish families. 

The essay continues with a short exploration of Black-Jewish relations as well as an explanation of what made the book so controversial in its day. The title isn’t actually what made waves back in 1927.

I wouldn’t have been able to write that essay without talking to two of my Jewish friends. We talked about antisemitism, racism, how it’s entrenched in the fabric of America, how we see it show up in our own experiences.

These conversations probably wouldn’t have happened without this project as an anchor. Because of this project, I’m seeking out more rich, nuanced conversations like this in my life.

As for the title, I ultimately changed it to Gather Up Yo’ Fine Clothes (find it here and here), a line from the same poem as the original title. It captures both the joy and the hardships Hughes explores in his poetry. One could just as easily gather up their fine clothes for a night of dancing as for church or a trip to the pawnshop. 

My own relationship to Blackness

Fine Clothes was controversial in its day, not because of it its title but because of its portrayal of Black folk. It didn’t only showcase what W.E.B. Du Bois called the Talented Tenth. It also included prostitutes and drinkers and poor folks and gamblers.

As I read the poetry and Hughes’ two essays I chose to feature, “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain” and “These Bad New Negroes: A Critique on Critics”, I was forced to contend with my own relationship to Blackness.

Hughes rails against respectability politics and the ways in which the Black middle class pretends proximity to whiteness will save them. Poring over those essays shook loose some residual internalized white supremacy.

I’ve also adopted a quote from “These Bad New Negroes: A Critique on Critics” as a motto of sorts.

“My poems are indelicate. But so is life.”

These words invite me to break down the respectable, good girl facade I’ve built so that I can enjoy the full poetry of life.

My creative identity

I’ve always shied away from calling myself a creative, though I’ve always written, danced, and played.

Towards the end of last year, I decided to start embracing my creative identity. I practiced having a creative point of view and bringing it into the world, knowing that not everyone would understand it.

I wanted the cover of the book to feel vibrant and fresh. Though the collection is nearly a century old, the themes are as relevant as ever. The cover needed to reflect that.

Illustrating the book stretched me. I had certain constraints. I would print the book in black and white. I had limited skills in Illustrator.

But I welcomed the chance to practice getting an idea out of my head and onto paper. I drew inspiration from Aaron Douglas’ silhouetted style. Douglas illustrated covers for several Harlem Renaissance authors. I wanted some pieces of the illustration to feel almost too big, too much, just as the original readers of the book felt. And ultimately, I wanted to reflect the themes of each section of the book.

Via the Ackland Art Museum

One of my favorites is the illustration I developed for the Beale Street Love section. Below is the illustration and the poem of the same name. (TW: Domestic violence.)

This poem is so simple and so brutal . I feel like I get punched in the stomach every time I read it.

I won’t win any awards for these illustrations, but, through creating them, I learned more about Illustrator and myself.

Why I’m sharing now

I didn’t initially share about the book because I didn’t want to distract people from the launch of Inner Workout. Then, I didn’t share because it felt vulnerable. It still feels vulnerable. This process ended up being more personal than I imagined it would be.

But that’s why I created this space, to hold the interests and explorations that don’t fit in the box of “Taylor the self-care lady.” To document my process while I’m still in it, learning, growing, and developing.

Final thoughts

At the beginning of this report, I said I did this project just for funzies. That’s 95% true. I do also make a couple dollars each time a book sells. It’s the tiniest bit of passive income. since I’m not planning on advertising it.

My dream for this project is that it would somehow get incorparated in to a high school class. If you know any high school English teachers, I’m happy to share the PDF version for free!

Ok, that’s it. This is what I do for fun. Read a book of poetry a million times. Attempt to give it a new life. Deepen skills. Have unexpected conversations. Ask myself the difficult questions. Mostly for funzies.🤗

If you want a copy of your own, you can find it here and here.