Of the Passing of the First-Born

From W.E.B. Dubois’ 1903 The Souls of Black Folk, this excerpt is a moving account of the short life and tragic death of his first-born son. In it is the wonder of creation, the bond between mother and child, the awakening love of a parent for his offspring, and the reality of a father of color seeing freedom in the loss. “Well sped, my boy, before the world had dubbed your ambition insolence, had held your ideals unattainable, and taught you to cringe and bow. Better far this nameless void...