Let's discuss "ROMANCE IN MARSEILLE" by CLAUDE MCKAY + dinner & drinks at WILDE

Featured on "Best Books of 2020" lists from publications like **The New Yorker**, **The Washington Post**, and **Vulture**, Romance in Marseille is a novel by Claude McKay published posthumously in 2020, **87 years after it was written**, as the original editors deemed it too transgressive for its time. Following the adventures of a rowdy troupe of dockworkers, sex workers, and political organizers--collectively straight and queer, disabled and able-bodied, African, European, Caribbean, and American, step into the culture-blending Vieux Port of Marseille at the height of the Jazz Age. Lafala is a black sailor (partly based on the real-life experiences of Nelson Simeon Dede, a Nigerian sailor McKay had met in Marseille) who becomes wealthy after winning a lawsuit against a shipping line for the mistreatment he experiences as a stowaway. With its scenes of black bodies fighting for pleasure and liberty even when stolen, McKay's novel explores the heritage of slavery amid an unforgiving modern economy. **As usual, after the discussion we'll go to Wilde Bar for dinner, drinks, and conversation. We hope to see you then!**