Visible Man: The Life of Henry Dumas

Jeffrey B. Leak, Visible Man: The Life of Henry Dumas (University of Georgia Press)

Jeffrey B. Leak is an associate professor of English and past director of the Center for the Study of the New South in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.

Henry Dumas (1934-1968) is a literary mystery. A writer associated with the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s, he held much promise until a rookie transit cop took his life on a subway platform in Harlem weeks after the assassination of Martin Luther King. At the time of his death, Dumas was relatively unknown. Leak’s biography of Dumas takes us from his origins in Sweet Home, Arkansas, to his intriguing literary and cultural experiences in New York and elsewhere, to the posthumous publication of his work.

Some of the people he encountered included future poets Robert Pinsky and Jay Wright, and novelist Ralph Ellison. The writer he didn’t meet but who influenced the publishing of his work after his death was Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison.

Visible Man weaves together Dumas’s various personal and artistic encounters that often were a source of angst and inspiration. Most significantly, the biography illuminates the life of an artist whose journey will cause moments of exhilaration and, alternately, deep breaths.

The Black Caucus of the American Library Association, Inc., gave Visible Man its annual best Nonfiction award for 2014. The book also won an award for Outstanding Academic Titles reviewed during the previous calendar year from CHOICE: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries.

Leak earned his Ph.D. in American Studies at Emory University. He has served in various administrative positions, including Interim Director of the College’s McNair Scholars Program, Faculty Fellow in Academic Affairs and, currently, is President of the Faculty at UNC Charlotte. He serves as a deacon at Friendship Missionary Baptist Church.