FIVE GENERATIONS HENCE (2)
By:
September 9, 2025
Five Generations Hence is a 1916 afrofuturist novel by Lillian B. Jones. It is considered unique in its pre-Harlem Renaissance, pre-Marcus-Garvey call for a transcontinental dialogue between Africa and America, one that hinges on economic self-sufficiency and most particularly on the high-minded ideas and deeds of intelligent women. HiLoBooks is pleased to serialize Chapter V, k for HILOBROW’s readers.
ALL INSTALLMENTS: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5.
Miss Noble’s head had fallen into the lap of her friend, her slight frame shook with convulsive gasps and the tears fell thick and fast.
“My dear, look up, what is it, have I wounded you?”
“No, no,” replied Miss Noble, trying to smile through her tears. “You have touched upon the secret of my life even to you, my tenderest and best friend — though it is for this purpose I come to talk to you — I scarcely have the temerity to admit that I have dared hope to produce anything worthy the perusal of my fellow man. The inspiration with the theme came six months ago. Then I felt equal to the task, but I’m not sure now; other incidents have occurred in my life, and though I am as eager now as then, I fear I lack some of the enthusiasm. When you mentioned what you did, I could but weep for pure joy that you had not forgotten these early desires of mine and to fancy it might be possible for me to succeed.”
“Most certainly,” replied Miss Gray, “but tell me, dear, of what will you write, or would you like to tell?”
“To you I would tell anything, especially this, because I know you will believe me; you know I would not lie to you after all that has passed today, and [given] the high esteem in which I hold you.”
“It all came about that autumn afternoon of which I have told you. I had spent a week of distressing reflections, it seemed a week of horrors to our people throughout the land, of which I read in the daily papers; there had been a lynching not far away, and it seemed that the end of my endurance was reached when numbers of my race, men and women and even children were attacked upon the streets of one of our leading cities, brutally assaulted and forced to flee like hunted beasts. Out of the anguish of my despairing heart I cried to God that day, prayed for strength and endurance. I walked through the woods, I saw God in each tree and flower, in each gentle breeze that scattered the autumn leaves at my feet. I felt so close to Him, I felt His presence in my soul.
“After a few hours of sore travail in the valley I ascended the hillside, reaching the summit; stood gazing at the landscape spread before me, but saw not the fields of ripening corn, nor those where swayed the cotton blossoms, not even the homes of my friends in the region below. I saw the Negroes for more than fourteen generations of oppression, attended by theft from their native shores and the crack of the whip about their heads, saw the land deluged in blood until this unnatural state was abrogated, I saw legislative disfranchisements and all manner of discriminations; I saw prejudice above, below and all around us. There arose a cry for peace, but the voice of mighty statesmen proclaimed that there could be no peace until the Negro recognized his position as vastly inferior to his Caucasian neighbor; and when I thought of the numbers of bright girls and boys whom knew, and of generations to follow, each evolving into higher degree of enlightenment, and remembered that these could never be free men and women, never feeling that they might sip the very essence of life be they so inclined, my heart was sore and I would have turned away and continued my journey in sorrow.” Here her voice sank almost to a whisper, her eyes shone like stars, the slightest tremor strayed about her lips. Miss Gray held tightly the little hand.
RADIUM AGE PROTO-SF: “Radium Age” is Josh Glenn’s name for the nascent sf genre’s c. 1900–1935 era, a period which saw the discovery of radioactivity, i.e., the revelation that matter itself is constantly in movement — a fitting metaphor for the first decades of the 20th century, during which old scientific, religious, political, and social certainties were shattered. More info here.
SERIALIZED BY HILOBOOKS: James Parker’s Cocky the Fox | Annalee Newitz’s “The Great Oxygen Race” | Matthew Battles’s “Imago” | & many more original and reissued novels and stories.