English Modernist Mary Butt’s literary genius was somewhat overshadowed by lurid tales of her personal life. She had romantic relationships with men and women, divorced twice, and suffered from addiction to alcohol and opium. However, her second novel, Armed with Madness has been called a “masterpiece of modern prose”. Amongst a story involving a coterie of post-war rural Britons investigating the mysterious appearance and movements of a jade cup, Butts utilizes a free-flowing prose style evocative of that often born through the spiritualist practice of automatic writing. Comparable to the formal innovations seen in Joyce’s Ulysses and the referential style of Eliot’s The Wasteland, Butts’ novel explores the tensions between the individual and the collective, abundance and lack, and the known and the unexplained to reflect on the modern condition and post-war trauma.

Although Haiti played a significant role in the Harlem Renaissance, serving as an international example of Black self-determination in the early 20th century, broader global interest and fascination with the Black Republic fully took hold in the mid-1920s, as the lengthy and controversial U.S. Occupation of Haiti (1915-1934) began receiving considerable public attention. Haiti inspired an outpouring of artistic expression in the United States, arguably Historian Mary Renda contends, giving "Americans the opportunity to reimagine their own nation and their own lives."

John W. Vandercook’s Black Majesty capitalized on the public fascination with Haiti, and in particular with the historical figure of King Henri Christophe. While short-lived, the Kingdom of Hayti (1811-1820) served as a central flashpoint of Black self-governance in the 19th century, ushering in the rapid development of trade, industry, culture, and education. It is a period of Haitian history little known outside of the island. Designed by Mahlone Blaine, the striking illustrated book cover prominently depicts King Christophe and accentuates his coat of arms–the crowned bird on the bed of claims–which goes on to become incorporated into the Haitian flag.

Set against the rugged backdrop of California’s coastal town of Big Sur Robinson Jeffers' poem Cawdor combines the tropes of classical epics with references to Shakespeare to paint a picture of familial tragedy. A mid-century icon of the environmental movement, Jeffers coined the term “inhumanism” to describe his belief that human beings are too self-centered to see the true beauty in the world around them or to realize the potential for beauty in themselves. In this belief, Jeffers set himself apart from his contemporaries, but his use of long verse was more narrative than that of poets like Ezra Pound and in setting his work in the West – not the rolling hills of England or the streets of Harlem – he reflected a different kind of modernist commentary. Despite his success in his time, Jeffers' work has faded from public engagement. His words may have new relevance, however, as humanity grapples with the increasing threat of climate change.

First privately published in Italy as a limited English-language edition, Lady Chatterley's Lover was an influential yet controversial novel whose plot challenged societal norms. It analyzed both the power dynamics between men and women and the impact of social class on personal freedom. Set in early 20th-century England, it follows Constance Chatterley, who, feeling unfulfilled in her marriage to a paralyzed aristocrat, embarks on an affair with the gamekeeper, Oliver Mellor. Its explicit sexual content and frank portrayal of adultery drew immediate controversy and censorship, resulting in bans in the United States, Canada, Australia, India, and Japan.

In 1960, the work became the center of a landmark obscenity trial when Penguin Books released an unexpurgated edition, marking a pivotal challenge to the long legacy of literary censorship. Lawyers, working on behalf of the publishers, argued that the novel possessed academic merit because of its frank exploration of essential themes of love, desire, and class struggle. Penguin's success at trial confirmed a shift in societal attitudes towards including sexual content in literature and reflected a broader acknowledgment of the artistic and thematic value of works that push boundaries.

Established in 1923, the American Indian Defense Association fought to defend religious freedom and property rights for Indigenous communities across the United States. This pamphlet, addressed “Dear Sir,” is a plea to the American Presidential Candidates for 1928 to attend to the urgent needs of the Indigenous people across the continent, including insufficient food and infrastructure, forced assimilation, and abuse at the hands of law enforcement and governmental agencies. Some of the demands outlined in section ten are still recognizable as necessary today and serve as a reminder of the work that has and has yet to be done to find peace and justice for all residents.

The lesser known of Larsen’s two main works (the other being Passing), Quicksand is a complex portrait of a biracial woman in the 1920s searching for peace and belonging in a world with little room for ambiguity. From a fictionalized version of the Tuskegee Institute to the doorstep of her uncle in Chicago, the home of an educated Black family in Harlem, and the white society circles in Copenhagen, Helga Crane runs from one community to another. Hypocrisy, bigotry, and fetishization, however, reveal themselves again and again, but Helga’s maddening restlessness and antagonistic character resist likeability. And yet, Larsen masterfully crafts a sympathetic story with an ending nothing short of heartbreaking. Quicksand demands the reader confront individual tragedy, not just that born from societal or systemic forces, in a way that is jarring and eye-opening. This copy still has its dust jacket, making it particularly rare.

In 1899, Marshall W. “Major” Taylor became the world champion in cycling, making him only the second African American world champion in any sport (following George Dixon’s bantamweight boxing world title in 1890). Taylor documents his experience, including the racial prejudice he encountered throughout his cycling career. Including first-person stories of races, photographs, excerpts from newspapers, and journal coverage, in which he was nicknamed the “Black Cyclone.” After winning the world championship, Major Taylor traveled internationally, racing against and beating many of the world’s best riders. Taylor included the subtitle, “the Story of a Colored Boy’s Indomitable Courage and Success Against Great Odds,” in the hope of providing advice to other Black athletes seeking to blaze their own trail.

Irish author Elizabeth Bowen’s debut novel The Hotel centers around a group of English tourists on holiday in the French Rivera against the backdrop of World War I. A sister novel to Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own and Elizabeth von Arnim’s Enchanted April, Bowen’s book is a slow commentary on British high society through the lens of her character’s interior lives. Her novels cataloged emotions rather than events, making her books a very particular kind of read. Bowen would go on to write ten novels and thirteen short story collections, including Eva Trout, or Changing Scenes, which was nominated for the Booker Prize in 1968.

In 35 scenes–told in verse and poetry–this innovative work tells the story of Haitian Revolutionary Toussaint L’Ouverture. In 1792, the enslaved people in Saint Domingue, France’s more lucrative colony, revolted. Led by Toussaint and later Jean Jacques Dessalines, the revolution lasted – and established Haiti as the world’s first free Black Republic. Author Leslie Pickney Hill’s play sought to frame the legacy of Toussaint and the Haitian Revolution for Black American audiences, hoping to correct the misguided notion that Black people have not contributed to civilization. Regarding the story of Toussaint, he presupposes, “nothing could be more startling to the modern reader than the story of a Negro functioning magnificently, almost sublimely, as a human being exactly like other human beings of the same exaltation.” The history Haytian revolution, both as fact and as interpretation, offered a hearty contradiction to such rhetoric.