Ernest J Gaines

From the author of, A Gathering of Old Men and The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman comes a deep and compassionate novel. Grant Wiggins, a college-educated man returns to 1940s Cajun, he visits and forms an unlikely bond with Jefferson, a young Black man convicted of murder and sentenced to death, for a crime he didn't commit. Together they come to understand the heroism of resisting. Best Books for Young Teen Readers. In the 1940s in rural Louisiana,...

A 110-year-old black woman reminisces about her life, which has stretched from the days of slavery to the black militancy and civil rights movements of the 1960s.

An affectionate and funny story set in the "black quarter" of a Southern sugar cane plantation in the 1940's and told by a child named Eddie, who watches his mother leave his father over his preoccupation with his car, which his father ultimately burns to the ground on the advice of a voodoo woman to get his wife back.

James has a raging toothache that necessitates a trip to the dentist. His mother (played by Emmy-winner Olivia Cole), accompanies James to town on an eye opening odyssey where the boy gains valuable insights into poverty, racism-and his own sense of pride. With an exciting musical score by Webster Lewis, this multi-award winning film explores a child's discovery that the world is a complicated place…where things are never truly black or white…only...

When young Marcus is bonded out of jail, where he has been awaiting his trial for murder, he is sent to the Hebert plantation to work in the fields. He treats the Cajun overseer, Sidney Bonbon, with supreme contempt, even as Bonbon works him nearly to death. Marcus takes his revenge by first seducing Bonbon's black mistress, Pauline, and then his wife, Louise. Jim Kelly, the tractor driver, watches the contest between the two men, knowing Marcus is...

"The winner in 1994 of the National Book Critics Circle Award for A Lesson Before Dying, Gaines, whose career spans more than thirty-five years, continues to receive increasing critical and popular attention. In the community of southern authors he finds his natural place. "Southern writers," he says, "have much more in common than differences. They have in common a certain point of view as well."" "Through television productions of his fiction -...

A frustrated teacher in a southern town, whose education is being underutilized, finds his own purpose in helping bring meaning to the last days of a young man due to be executed. In teaching one person to die with dignity, he redeems himself.

The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is a highly acclaimed drama, based on the epic novel by Ernest J. Gaines. It covers the American Experience from the Civil War to the civil rights movement, all told from the memories of a fictional 110 year old former slave, played by Cicely Tyson. Ms. Tysons tour de force performance earned her two Emmys, best actress and actress of the year 1974. This film won nine Emmys, including best picture and was named...