A Literary Guide to Washington, DC

From Capitol marble to U Street’s jazz-veined sidewalks, A Literary Guide to Washington, DC whisks you through five electric eras in the city’s vibrant story: waxing poems in Joel Barlow’s post-Revolution salons, Civil War dispatches penned by Charlotte Forten Grimké under torchlight, Reconstruction speeches that James Weldon Johnson turned into gospel hymns, and Jazz Age nights where Langston Hughes’s verses danced beneath Zora Neale Hurston’s brimmed hat. Along LeDroit Park’s ornamental gates and Shaw’s mural-stitched walls, you’ll eavesdrop on Alice Dunbar-Nelson’s salon debates, trace Walt Whitman’s trail from Pennsylvania Avenue to Lafayette Square, and stand beneath the Nobel breath of Sinclair Lewis outside his Lafayette Park lodgings. Kim Roberts’s part walking tour, part anthology celebrates Cultural Understanding and Education Equity by showing how African American pioneers reshaped the city’s literary heartbeat, how Paul Laurence Dunbar’s dialect rang like church bells across balconies, and how every page turned adds a new voice to democracy’s chorus. Perfect for classroom explorations, faith-based book groups, or armchair history buffs, this guide illuminates Washington’s hidden chapters and invites every reader to write their own footnote in the capital’s enduring narrative. Tap the Save to List button to bookmark this title, or tap the External Link button to view purchase and rental options.