Triangular Road: A Memoir [Hardcover]

USA Today
“Marshall's melodious voice is mesmerizing. The only complaint here is the reader is left wanting more of it.”

Dallas Morning News
“Writer Paule Marshall has long been a quiet national treasure, creating rich characters whose stories seep into our souls as they explore their complex Caribbean and American roots….This isn't just a memoir. It's a book that provides a rare, honest look at the deep, personal well where one writer draws her strength, a gift that anyone interested in understanding literature should cherish.”

USA Today
“This slim, elegant memoir traces the author's life from Africa to Barbados to Brooklyn, her melodious voice leaving readers aching for more.”

In Triangular Road, famed novelist Paule Marshall tells the story of her years as a fledgling young writer in the 1960s. A memoir of self-discovery, it also offers an affectionate tribute to the inimitable Langston Hughes, who entered Marshall’s life during a crucial phase and introduced her to the world of European letters during a whirlwind tour of the continent funded by the State Department. In the course of her journeys to Europe, Barbados, and eventually Africa, Marshall comes to comprehend the historical enormity of the African diaspora, an understanding that fortifies her sense of purpose as a writer.

In this unflinchingly honest memoir, Paule Marshall offers an indelible portrait of a young black woman coming of age as a novelist in a literary world dominated by white men.

Paule Marshall is the author of five novels: Brown Girl, Brownstones; The Chosen Place, The Timeless People; Praisesong for the Widow; Daughters; and The Fisher King. A MacArthur Fellow and winner of the Dos Passos Prize for Literature, Professor Marshall has taught at various universities over the course of her lifetime; she now holds the Helen Gould Sheppard Chair of Literature and Culture at New York University. She lives in New York and Richmond, Virginia.