--To My Public--

STATEMENT IN ROUND NUMBERS CONCERNING
THE RELATIVE MERITS OF "WAY DOWN SOUTH"
AND "DON'T YOU WANT TO BE FREE" AS COM-
PILED BY THE AUTHOR MR. LANGSTON HUGHES:

Sent to
Louise
Loren
Arna

The best thing about WAY DOWN SOUTH is that—

1st: It paid my mother's funeral bill.

2nd: It paid both the Cleveland and New York
doctor's bills.

3rd: It paid several hundred dollars back debts
that worried my soul.

4th: It secured for me two new suits, two pairs of
shoes, and a half dozen shirts—the first in
three years.

And still left me a couple of hundred dollars to sit down
for a few weeks and write a first draft of THE BIG SEA, a
book I had been trying to see my way clear to do for years,
but had no financial peace of mind to do it on.

NOW DON'T YOU WANT TO BE FREE—

1st: Although performed all told more than two hundred times in six of the largest cities of America, and served as the formation of five new Negro theatre groups, the total income from royalties to date has been $40.00.

2nd: It was published in THE ONE-ACT PLAY MAGAZINE that shortly thereafter went under and did not pay anything at all for publication.

3rd: Typing, time, and the giving away of free copies in order to stimulate production has to date cost much more than the $40.00 income from royalties.

Of course, I am delighted to present DON'T YOU WANT TO BE FREE as a gift to the Negro people. But, on the other hand, starvation is not always amusing. For public consumption: *Take your choice.*

RETORICAL QUESTION: WHAT DO YOU THINK????????

God Being My Witness

November 6, 1939.