
Drawing on a wealth of archival material-including FBI files, prison records, and interviews with Beck, his wife, and his daughters-Gifford explores the sexual trauma and racial violence Beck endured that led to his reinvention as Iceberg Slim, one of America's most infamous pimps of the 1940s and '50s. 1 His novels were deeply influenced by the work of Iceberg Slim. Clark Decem October 21, 1974) was an African-American writer of urban fiction.
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From slick con men, classic tales of revenge, to a heist gone awry, Robert Beck, the man. Kenyatta series ( Crime Partners, Death List, Kenyatta's Escape, Kenyatta's Last Hit) Black Gangster.
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Iceberg Slim’s story is now depicted in a major motion picture distributed worldwide. Street Poison: The Biography of Iceberg Slim Justin Gifford Doubleday: 288 pp., 26.95 Laymon is professor of English at Vassar College and the author, most recently, of How to Slowly Kill.

Literature professor Justin Gifford has been researching the life and work of Robert Beck for a decade, culminating in Street Poison, a colorful and compassionate biography of one of the most complicated figures in twentieth-century literature. In this collection of six gritty tales from the underground, Iceberg Slim creates a tribute to the streets and those forced to try to survive them. Catapulted into the public eye, Slim became a new American hero, known for speaking the truth whether that truth was ugly, sexy, rude, or blunt. You can't understand contemporary black (and even American) culture without reckoning with Iceberg Slim and his many acolytes and imitators. From a career as a, yes, ruthless pimp in the '40s and '50s, Iceberg Slim refashioned himself as the first and still the greatest of "street lit" masters, whose vivid books have made him an icon to such rappers as Ice-T, Jay-Z, and Snoop Dogg and a presiding spirit of "blaxploitation" culture. Aug April 30, 1992), better known as Iceberg Slim, was an American former pimp who later.

It is the story of the tragic destruction of an African American family. Robert Beck (born Robert Lee Maupin or Robert Moppins Jr. previous 1 2 next sort by previous 1 2 next Note: these are all the books on Goodreads for this author. Summary: "The first and definitive biography of one of America's bestselling, notorious, and influential writers of the twentieth century: Iceberg Slim, né Robert Beck, author of the multimillion-copy memoir Pimp and such equally popular novels as Trick Baby and Mama Black Widow. Most White people don't know about gritty African American author Iceberg Slim or what should be his classic book Mama Black Widow. Iceberg Slim Average rating 4.02 17,339 ratings 1,385 reviews shelved 50,685 times Showing 30 distinct works.
