Uncle Remus

In 1880, Joel Chandler Harris, a moderate white Southern journalist, published a collection of black folktales, proverbs, songs, and character sketches based on stories he had heard as a child. In his introduction, Robert Hemenway discusses the book's enduring popularity, pointing out that the character of Uncle Remus, the docile and grandfatherly ex-slave storyteller, is a utopian figure-a literary creation by Harris that reassured white readers during the tense and tentative Reconstruction. By contrast, the feisty Brer Rabbit was a mainstay of black folklore long before Harris heard of his exploits. Brer Rabbit's cunning and revolutionary antics symbolically inverted the slave-master relationship and satisfied the deep human needs of a captive people... Joel Chandler Harris (December 9, 1848 - July 3, 1908) was an American journalist, fiction writer, and folklorist best known for his collection of Uncle Remus stories. Harris was born in Eatonton, Georgia, where he served as an apprentice on a plantation during his teenage years. He spent the majority of his adult life in Atlanta working as an associate editor at the Atlanta Constitution. Harris led two professional lives: as the editor and journalist known as Joe Harris, he supported a vision of the New South with the editor Henry W. Grady (1880-1889), stressing regional and racial reconciliation after the Reconstruction era. As Joel Chandler Harris, fiction writer and folklorist, he wrote many 'Brer Rabbit' stories from the African-American oral tradition and helped to revolutionize literature in the process.... Arthur Burdett Frost (January 17, 1851 - June 22, 1928), was an American illustrator, graphic artist and comics writer. He was also well known as a painter. Frost's work is well known for its dynamic representation of motion and sequence. Frost is considered one of the great illustrators in the "Golden Age of American Illustration." Frost illustrated over 90 books and produced hundreds of paintings; in addition to his work in illustrations, he is renowned for realistic hunting and shooting prints....