The Pasteboard Bandit (The Iona and Peter Opie Library of Children's Literature) - Tapa dura

Originally written in 1935 and left unpublished, a story by two great twentieth-century black poets follows the adventures of an American boy in Mexico with his two companions--one of them a pasteboard bandit named Tito.

Arna Bontemps (1902-1973) was born in Louisiana and grew up in California. He moved to New York City in 1923, and it was there that he met Langston Hughes and other Harlem Renaissance writers. Bontemps is known as one or our major African-American poets, but he is also credited with making black folklore and literature available to the public through his anthologies and through his work as a historian, librarian, and teacher at several American universities.

Langston Hughes (1902-1967) was born in Joplin, Missouri, and grew up in Kansas, Illinois, and Ohio. He moved to New York City and lived on 127th Street in Harlem for most of his adult life. One of the most versatile writers of the Harlem Renaissance, Hughes wrote poetry, plays, essays, novels, and short stories.

Peggy Turley has a B.A. in history from the University of Memphis, where she studied painting and photography. She lives in Memphis and and is the illustrator ofArmadillo Ray.

Cheryl A. Wall is Professor of English at Rutgers University.