WALTER WHITE
SIXTY-NINE FIFTH AVENUE
NEW YORK CITY

27 February 1929.

Dear Mr. Bryher:

I have your letter of February 16th and would like very much to do the article you ask me to do by the 15th of March. I am terribly sorry but it is absolutely out of the question for me to do a piece by that time inasmuch as I am just at the moment engaged in correcting proofs of a new book of mine and also in doing some articles which I promised sometime ago.

There is another reason why I would not like to do the article just now. As a result of the successful use of Negro themes in the American theatre and the acclaim which has come to Negro artists in the theatre, on the concert platform and through the work of Negro novelists and poets, there is now beginning to be seen a considerable activity in the world of the cinema with Negro life as the material used. Four of the biggest cinema producing companies in the United States are at present at work on Negro pictures. One of them, "Hearts in Dixie", produced by William Fox is to have its world premiere tonight.

From what I have heard of all of these pictures now being made none of them reaches a very high level either of interpretation of Negro life or honest presentation of genuine Negro material. All four of them are of the minstrel show, "Befo' de war", type. That, however, does not seem to me important. With the vast amount of race prejudice in America and particularly because the producers of moving pictures must depend upon a nation-wide distribution which includes the South, it is almost impossible to start off with the presentation of anything but the old stereotyped concepts of the Negro.

Perhaps in time we may evolve to the point where moving picture producers and distributors may have intelligence and courage enough to utilize the excellent material contained in some of the more notable novels written about the Negro by Negro and white writers during the last few years.

Frankly, I am not hopeful of this for some years to come. Perhaps the only way such a picture could be done probably would be through its production by a European company and then brought to America with the accolade of a European success precisely as Krenek's "Jonny Spielt Auf" recently gained some attention and success in the world of the opera.