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John Henry Days is a 2001 novel by American author Colson Whitehead. This is his second full-length work. Plot summary. Building the railways that made America, John Henry died with a hammer in his hand moments after competing against a steam drill in a battle of endurance. The story of his death made him a legend.
- Colson Whitehead
- 2001
Acclaimed Pulitzer Prize-winning author Colson Whitehead’s novel John Henry Days (2001) is a postmodern social satire that weaves together several narrative threads to create a novel “with encyclopedic aspirations akin to Moby Dick or Ulysses,” according to David Foster Wallace.
John Henry is an American folk hero. An African American freedman, he is said to have worked as a "steel-driving man"—a man tasked with hammering a steel drill into a rock to make holes for explosives to blast the rock in constructing a railroad tunnel.
Jan 1, 2001 · The focus is on John Henry Days, a festival in West Virginia that has been created to celebrate John Henry and the issuing of a stamp of him, but more importantly to bring tourists to two small and economically struggling towns.
- (3.2K)
- Paperback
A sprawling, ambitious novel which uses a weekend festival in honor of John Henry as the focal point for a serio-comic look at the meaning of race, self-will, and the search for meaning in ...
John Henry Holliday (August 14, 1851 – November 8, 1887), better known as Doc Holliday, was an American dentist, gambler, and gunfighter who was a close friend and associate of lawman Wyatt Earp. Holliday is best known for his role in the events surrounding and his participation in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in Tombstone, Arizona.
Dive deep into Colson Whitehead's John Henry Days with extended analysis, commentary, and discussion.
