The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man is the fictional account of a young biracial man, referred to only as the Ex-Colored Man, living in post-Reconstruction era America in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He lives through a variety of experiences, including witnessing a lynching, that convince him to pass as white to secure his safety and advancement, but he feels as if he has given up his dream of glorifying the black race by composing ragtime music.

James Weldon Johnson originally published The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man anonymously in 1912, because he was uncertain how the potentially controversial book would affect his diplomatic career. He wrote openly about issues of race and discrimination that were not common then in literature. The book’s initial public reception was poor. It was republished in 1927, with some minor changes of phraseology, by Alfred A. Knopf, an influential firm that published many Harlem Renaissance writers, and Johnson was credited as the author.

This case laminate collector’s edition includes a Victorian inspired dust-jacket.