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To Smile in Autumn A Memoir Gordon Parks Foreword by Alexs Pate Table of Contents		$18.95 paper ISBN: 978-0-8166-6555-6
Gordon Parks was born with, he says, “a stubborn need to be somebody.” Though Parks is remembered most notably as a photographer and filmmaker, on his enthralling climb to fame between 1944 and 1978 he was successful in many pursuits, including journalism, poetry, and music. It was not always an easy journey, but by thirty-six he had overcome many obstacles to become a photographer and writer for Life magazine. To Smile in Autumn is a candid revelation of a man in the prime of his life and career. This autobiography, with a new foreword by Alexs Pate, is a testament to a person much attuned to the greater world and driven to leave his mark on it. “Mr. Parks’s achievements would be exceptional no matter what his background, but when compared with the bleakness and hardship of his childhood they seem nothing less than outsized.” —New York Times, 1979 “Gordon Parks was like the Jackie Robinson of film.” —Donald Faulkner, Director, New York State Writers Institute Gordon Parks was a photographer, musician, poet, novelist, journalist, activist, and film director. He was the author of several books, including The Learning Tree, and director of the 1971 film Shaft. Alexs Pate is author of several novels, including Amistad, West of Rehoboth, and Finding Makeba. 248 pages | 82 b&w photos | 5 1/2 x 8 1/2 | 2009 TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword                        Alexs D. Pate                                                                        1. Garbage cans and supper                                                                        2. “Welcome to Life!”                                                                                    3. Assignment                                                                                                4. An island unto myself                                                                                    5. Two years in Paris                                                                                    6. Music, Poetry, and discarded Heroes                                                            7. From Farouk, a tennis racquet—From Churchill, a fat cigar                        8. Preparing for the smoldering fire                                                            9. Gloria Vanderbilt and her dreams                                                            10. Breakup with Sally                                                                                    11. Freddie: “Segregation in the South”                                                            12. Execution at San Quentin                                                                        13. Duke Ellington: “Big Red”                                                                        14. The Learning Tree and Elizabeth                                                            15. Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, and “White Devils”                        16. Genevieve Young and A Choice of Weapons                                    17. Malcolm X murdered. Parks next?                                                            18. Unfaithful to my emotions?                                                                        19. A son goes to war                                                                                    20. Muhammad Ali and Vietnam                                                                        21. Love, War, and Confusion                                                                        22. Stokely Carmichael, “No more running!”                                                23. “Why are Negroes looting and burning . . . ?”                                    24. Leslie Campbell Parks is born                                                                        25. Diary of a Harlem family                                                                        26. “I don’t want a long funeral.”—Martin Luther King                        27. Gun Power: The Black Panthers                                                            28. “We want you in the Black Panthers.”                                                29. The Learning Tree cameras roll                                                            39. To open doors                                                                                                31. “ . . . the Spingarn Medal will suffice.”                                                32. Genevieve: “Ah, love, let us be true . . . ”                                                Epilogue

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