Get Discount 10% Off
Subscribe to our newsletters now and stay up-to-date with new arrivals, updates and deals.
MILLIONS OF TITLES TO CHOOSE FROM
Currency
King Comus
Past and present collide in this posthumous, semiautobiographical masterpiece by the author of Beetlecreek. "One of the...
- $20.40 USD
- $20.40 USD
- Unit price
- per
Please hurry! Only 105 left in stock
Couldn't load pickup availability
Past and present collide in this posthumous, semiautobiographical masterpiece by the author of Beetlecreek. "One of the great novelists of the last 100 years." --Ishmael Reed, author of Mumbo Jumbo In the present day, a Black American expat to Rome named D. reconnects with his former Army friend, Tillman, and their former commanding officer, Joe Stabat, to organize a gospel summit for the singer Little Antioch. In the 1940s, as D. becomes enmeshed in Tillman's large and boisterous family for the first time, Tillman recounts the story of his fabled ancestor King Comus. And in the early nineteenth century, master musician King Comus embarks on a grand journey to freedom from enslavement. In this time-bending tale of survival and kinship, the product of more than twenty years of literary labor, William Demby weaves elements of the neo-slave narrative and Afrofuturism into a panoramic vision encompassing the forces of empire, race, gender, and religion.
Author: William Demby
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 05/12/2026
Pages: 288
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.63lbs
Size: 7.99h x 5.19w x 0.86d
ISBN: 9798217007370
About the Author
William Demby was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on December 25, 1922, and attended college in Clarksburg, West Virginia, before enlisting in World War II and serving in Italy. He graduated from Fisk University in 1947 then moved abroad to Rome, where he spent the next two decades working as a novelist, journalist, and script translator and screenwriter for the Italian cinema. In the late 1960s, Demby joined the faculty at The College of Staten Island, dividing his time between the United States and Italy. His works include Beetlecreek, The Catacombs, Love Story Black, and King Comus. In 2006, he was the recipient of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Lifetime Achievement. He died in Sag Harbor, New York, in 2013. Melanie Masterton is a lecturer at the California Institute of Technology. Her scholarly work appears in journals including Modern Language Notes, Modernism/modernity, Pacific Coast Philology, California Italian Studies, and Italian Quarterly. William Demby is a key protagonist in her current manuscript devoted to a cohort of African American writers, artists, and performers in postwar Rome and their Italian creative circles. With Ugo Rubeo and James C. Hall, she guest-edited New Perspectives on William Demby, a special issue of African American Review.
Author: William Demby
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 05/12/2026
Pages: 288
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.63lbs
Size: 7.99h x 5.19w x 0.86d
ISBN: 9798217007370
About the Author
William Demby was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on December 25, 1922, and attended college in Clarksburg, West Virginia, before enlisting in World War II and serving in Italy. He graduated from Fisk University in 1947 then moved abroad to Rome, where he spent the next two decades working as a novelist, journalist, and script translator and screenwriter for the Italian cinema. In the late 1960s, Demby joined the faculty at The College of Staten Island, dividing his time between the United States and Italy. His works include Beetlecreek, The Catacombs, Love Story Black, and King Comus. In 2006, he was the recipient of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Lifetime Achievement. He died in Sag Harbor, New York, in 2013. Melanie Masterton is a lecturer at the California Institute of Technology. Her scholarly work appears in journals including Modern Language Notes, Modernism/modernity, Pacific Coast Philology, California Italian Studies, and Italian Quarterly. William Demby is a key protagonist in her current manuscript devoted to a cohort of African American writers, artists, and performers in postwar Rome and their Italian creative circles. With Ugo Rubeo and James C. Hall, she guest-edited New Perspectives on William Demby, a special issue of African American Review.
Returns Policy
You may return most new, unopened items within 30 days of delivery for a full refund. We'll also pay the return shipping costs if the return is a result of our error (you received an incorrect or defective item, etc.).
You should expect to receive your refund within four weeks of giving your package to the return shipper, however, in many cases you will receive a refund more quickly. This time period includes the transit time for us to receive your return from the shipper (5 to 10 business days), the time it takes us to process your return once we receive it (3 to 5 business days), and the time it takes your bank to process our refund request (5 to 10 business days).
If you need to return an item, simply login to your account, view the order using the "Complete Orders" link under the My Account menu and click the Return Item(s) button. We'll notify you via e-mail of your refund once we've received and processed the returned item.
Shipping
We can ship to virtually any address in the world. Note that there are restrictions on some products, and some products cannot be shipped to international destinations.
When you place an order, we will estimate shipping and delivery dates for you based on the availability of your items and the shipping options you choose. Depending on the shipping provider you choose, shipping date estimates may appear on the shipping quotes page.
Please also note that the shipping rates for many items we sell are weight-based. The weight of any such item can be found on its detail page. To reflect the policies of the shipping companies we use, all weights will be rounded up to the next full pound.
- Choosing a selection results in a full page refresh.