CAMILLE F. FORBES
Author * Historian * Performer

"Camille F. Forbes has produced a history not only of a life and an industry, but also of our ideas about the performance and theatricality of race itself. This is a significant contribution to the field of African American Studies as well as a model of how to pull a story out of archives and historical records that do not always cooperate.”

—Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Alphonse Fletcher University Professor, Harvard University


"This book combines the fascinating biography of Bert Williams with the enriched history of blacks in American show business....It is a welcome addition to my personal library.”

—David Jasen, author of Rags and Ragtime: A Musical History