One of the many books from the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s that I need to read is George Schuyler's Black No More. It is described as a satirical novel in which, writes historian David Levering Lewis in When Harlem Was in Vogue (Vintage Books, 1982), "Dr. Junius Crookman, an Afro-American scientist, invents a process--'by electrical nutrition and glandular control'--which turns dark skin white and crinkly hair straight."
The book was recently adapted into an off-Broadway musical, complete with choreography by the renowned Bill T. Jones.
Schuyler, a black conservative, and his white wife, were the parents of a biracial child, Philippa, who became a piano prodigy. Joseph Mitchell of the New Yorker magazine wrote two lengthy profiles of Philippa in the 1940s when she was still a child. In 1967, covering the Vietnam War as a photojournalist, she was killed in a helicopter crash.
For a time there was talk of turning her life story into a feature-length movie, with singer Alicia Keys, herself a piano prodigy, portraying Philippa.
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