Appraisal of Claude McKay's Work

In his poetry and fiction, as well as in his political and social commentaries, McKay searched for a solid foundation for a valid black identity among the working-class cultures of the West Indies and the United States. He was an undeniably important predecessor to such younger writers of the Harlem Renaissance as Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen and also to influential West Indian and African writers such as C. L. R. James and AimÈ CÈsaire.