Nothing Less Than Love

An ideal introduction to the work of the poet, activist, and visionary whom Toni Morrison called “our premiere Black woman essayist”

A Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition, with flaps and deckle-edged paper

“I believe that the creative spirit is nothing less than love made manifest.” —June Jordan

Love is dangerous. That is why the work of the most stringently censored Black feminist poet and essayist of the twentieth century is suffused with it. Drawn from the full span of June Jordan’s career, this volume is an ideal introduction to the most widely published African American writer of her time, a visionary and a courageous agitator for change who fought on the front lines of American literature and transnational injustice, modeling with ferocity her vision of a lover who is a fighter and a fighter who is always motivated by love.

Nothing Less Than Love encompasses Jordan’s exploration of Black English, her critiques of Western education, greed, and individualism, her condemnations of racism, misogyny, homophobia, and genocide, and her essays on sexual liberation, the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, the September 11 attacks, unjust wars, her solidarity with Palestine, and her own battle with breast cancer. It includes such never-before-published essays as a moving tribute to Audre Lorde and a rousing letter to the editors of The New York Times, as well as cherished works as “Where Is the Love?” and “Notes of a Barnard Dropout.” Here is nothing less than a masterclass in how to find the love within our rage to feed, clothe, and change our communities, with June Jordan as our passionate teacher.

Penguin Classics is the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world, representing a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.