About this item
The first and definitive biography of one of America's bestselling, notorious, and influential writers of the twentieth century: Iceberg Slim, n Robert Beck, author of the multimillion-copy memoir Pimp and such equally popular novels as Trick Baby and Mama Black Widow. From a career as a, yes, ruthless pimp in the '40s and '50s, Iceberg Slim refashioned himself as the first and still the greatest of "street lit" masters, whose vivid books have made him an icon to such rappers as Ice-T, Jay-Z, and Snoop Dogg and a presiding spirit of "blaxploitation" culture. You can't understand contemporary black (and even American) culture without reckoning with Iceberg Slim and his many acolytes and imitators. Literature professor Justin Gifford has been researching the life and work of Robert Beck for a decade, culminating in Street Poison, a colorful and compassionate biography of one of the most complicated figures in twentieth-century literature.
About the Author
Dr. Justin Gifford is an associate professor of English Literature at the University of Nevada, Reno. His teaching and research focus on American literature, and he is a specialist in African American archives and popular fiction. He is the acclaimed author of multiple books, including "Revolution or Death: The Life of Eldridge Cleaver," "Pimping Fictions: African American Crime Literature and the Untold Story of Black Publishing," and "Street Poison: The Biography of Iceberg Slim," which was named one of Amazon.com's best 100 books of the year.
