Maud Martha
Maud Martha is the only novel written by Pulitzer Prize winning African American poet Gwendolyn Brooks. Published in 1953 by Harper & Brothers and reprinted by Third World Press, it includes a series of vignettes following the title character Maud Martha as she negotiates the passage from childhood to adulthood in black Chicago neighbourhoods.Style
Structurally, the novel has a nonlinear narrative, that also is explained in poetic language unusual to novels. Rather, as critic GerShun Avilez describes it, it is a "fragmentary poetic narrative." Other critics focus on its artistic connection to Brook's poetry; Asali Solomon highlighted the language of the novel saying that it is good at "gracefully evoking the nastiness of life." Writing for the Poetry Foundation, writer Sandra Jackson-Opoku disagreed with the assertion that the narrative of the novel is nonlinear.Reception
Reviewing the novel for NPR in 2006, Asali Solomon said the character's life "resembles your life or mine: good days and bad, no headlines."
