Radical Writers.

Thursday, April 27, 2000

2 Madison authors will read from their recent works. Sponsored by Rainbow Bookstore Cooperative.Stephen Kantrowitz, born and raised in the Deep North, teaches the history of the South, the Civil War, and white supremacy at UW-Madison. He will be reading from his first book, "Ben Tillman and the Reconstruction of White Supremacy" (University of North Carolina Press, 2000) which deals with the history of white male supremacy and its discontents from the collapse of Southern slavery to the age of disfranchisement and Jim Crow. Tillman, born into a wealthy slaveholding family in South Carolina, spent his adult life attempting to recreate the world he had lost. As an anti-Reconstruction terrorist, he helped beat back black and white challenges to white supremacy; later, he took control of the state Democratic party in the name of "the farmers." During two terms as governor and four as U.S. senator, he steered a complicated political course between conservatives and Populists, seeking a balance of local control and state-level reform that might protect white men and their households from federal intrusion, "Negro domination," and the machinations of the Northern "Money Power."Craig Werner, Prof. of African-American History, UW-Madison, will be reading from his widely acclaimed "A Change is Gonna Come - Music, Race and the Soul of America." The book chronicles more than forty years of black music and its impact on the broader culture from the 1950s forward. Highly praised by a spectrum extending from Henry Louis Gates of Harvard to rock legend Bruce Springsteen, Werner's account tells us a great deal about who we are.Have a cup of java, hear some words, and get your book signed!!