Herbert A. Simmons Papers

Biographical Note

Born in St. Louis in 1931, Herbert Simmons attended Lincoln University in Missouri where he studied journalism. He interrupted studies to do military service and then returned to his education at St. Louis Washington University where he graduated with a B.A. in English Composition. He published his first novel, Corner Boy, in 1957 and was awarded a Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship. The book was later published in Great Britain and adapted for the stage in 1979.

Simmons started working on his second novel, Man Walking on Eggshells, in the early 1960s. It was published in 1961. The novel was supposed to be part of a trilogy titled Destined to Free. Parts two and three, tentatively titled, Tough Country and The Land of Nod, were never published. After the Watts Uprising in Los Angeles in 1965, Simmons was a key participant in the Watts Writers Workshop. He later became a lecturer at California State University, Northridge.

Sources

• Simmons, Herbert A. “A Gutter Full of Dreams” in Negro Digest, January 1962, pp. 54-59.
• Tew, Philip, “Re-invoking Herbert Simmons: Man Walking on Eggshells of Radical Narrative” in Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies, Vol. 5, No. 2 (1999), pp. 109-126

Scope and Content

Herbert Simmons was one of the earliest Black crime genre writers. His protagonists fought the restrictive nature of white society toward Black men. His papers consist of the galleys for Man Walking on Eggshells, with author’s marginalia.

Arrangement

These galleys are arranged in the author’s original order.

Related materials

Related materials at the Chicago Public Library include:

• Heritage Press Archives

Container List

Series 1: Manuscript, Man Walking on Eggshells, 1961

Sub-series 1: Part 1 “Walking,” 1961

Sub-series 2: Part 2 “So What?,” 1961

Sub-series 3: Part 3 “Round Midnight,” 1961