The Souls of Black Folk

W. E. B. Du Bois The Souls of Black Folk (1903) is a seminal work in African American literature and an American classic. In this work Du Bois proposes that the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line. His concepts of life behind the veil of race and the resulting double-consciousness this sense of always looking at ones self through the eyes of others have become touchstones for thinking about race in America. In addition to these enduring concepts Souls offers an assessment of the progress of the race the obstacles to that progress and the possibilities for future progress as the nation entered the twentieth century.