The final installment in Josh MacPhee's analysis of the covers used in various editions of Fanon's books

Just Seeds

Now that I've gone through all the Fanon titles proper, here is a collection of strange odds and ends, books that contain Fanon's writing, but aren't standard editions. To start with is this great catalog produced by Presence Africaine for a memorial conference on Fanon in 1982 (although I believe the book didn't come out until 1984). The central graphic leans on the same African mask trope on so many Fanon covers, but flips the script a bit, but piling the masks on top of each other to make a new sculptural form, and arming that form with a rifle. In addition, the arched figures at the bottom are reminiscent of some of the post-Independence, utopian Modernist architecture that was built in major African cities like Nairobi and Lagos.

Part 6 of Josh MacPhee's series on the covers of various editions of Fanon's books

Just Seeds

Toward the African Revolution was first published in 1964, after Fanon's death. It is a broad collection of his short essays, many written while he was traveling across Africa as the Ambassador to Ghana for the Provisional Algerian Government. The first English translation was published in a hardback edition by Monthly Review Press (in 1967). Like Studies in A Dying Colonialism, the cover is largely text-based, even more subdued than Studies.

Part 5 of Josh MacPhee's series on the covers of various editions of Fanon's books

Just Seeds

The second book written by Fanon was A Dying Colonialism. The book was originally published in 1959 by Maspero in France asYear Five of the Algerian Revolution, then later renamed Sociology of Revolution, titled Studies In A Dying Colonialism when translated into English and published by Monthly Review in 1965, and shortened to simply A Dying Colonialism when distributed as a mass-market paperback by Grove Press. (Two years after Wretched of the Earth was translated and published in English.) This book is Fanon's look at the Algerian War, and specifically at the ways in which Algerians resist, both physically and psychologically, French colonialism and racism.

Part 4 of Josh MacPhee's series on the covers of various editions of Fanon's books

Just Seeds

Frantz Fanon's Black Skin, White Masks was initially published in 1952 by Editions Du Seuil. I've been digging around and have yet to find a cover for that first edition, the best I can do is a 1965 edition from Du Seuil, to the right. There is usually little to say about French covers, and Continental covers more broadly from this period, because they are almost all clean and austere, with minimal graphic qualities and simple series' markings and the title and author in a clean typeface. (For the run down on the English-language editions of Black Skin, click HERE).

Part 3 of Josh MacPhee's series on the covers of various editions of Fanon's books

by Josh MacPhee, Just Seeds

Part 3

If Wretched of the Earth is Fanon's manual for anti-colonial revolt, Black Skin, White Masks is the intellectual backbone behind it. Originally published in 1952, and based on his rejected doctoral thesis, it lays out the ideas behind the revolt—the psychological effects of colonialism. Although it is Fanon's first book, it wasn't published in English (by Grove Press) until 1967, six years after his death, and four years after Grove publishedWretched of the Earth.

Further reflections on the covers of various editions of Fanon's books

by Josh MacPhee, Just Seeds

Part 2

Let's start off part two of the covers of Fanon's Wretched of the Earth (read part one HERE) with this beautiful cover from the 1961 Portuguese edition published by Editora Ulizzeia. Aesthetically I find this design stunning, the landscape of the mask flattened by the orange overprint, the strong tall gothic type springing from the forehead of the mask, everything is in balance.

Politically it's a bit less convincing. Although Fanon's first book is entitled Black Skin, White Masks, the use of a Sub-Saharan African mask on a book about the Algerian anti-colonial struggle seems a bit off. In the coming weeks as I go through all the Fanon titles and their covers, you'll see how this mask theme keeps coming back, regardless of whether it is appropriate for the specific book or not.

Thoughts on various editions of Fanon's books

by Josh MacPhee, Just Seeds

I can't quite remember exactly when and where I was first introduced to Frantz Fanon. I do remember pulling down the pocket paperback to the right (Grove Press, 1968) off a shelf at a bookstore, and being intrigued by the orange and black mass in motion on the cover. I assume I knew who Fanon was, or picked it up because I had been told I should by someone, but those specifics have slipped away. Then again, if the title Wretched of the Earth didn't completely capture me, I suspect the subtitle added to this American edition—"The Handbook for the Black Revolution that is Changing the Shape of the World"—would have been more than enough to convince me to fork over the $3 it likely cost.