Amid hurdles of cultural erasure and attempts to minimize African American history, DMV-based authors A’Lelia Bundles, Juanita Tolliver and Dr. Dana Williams are respectively leveraging truth and storytelling to set the record straight on four formidable Black sheroes: A’Lelia Walker, Toni Morrison and the dynamic duo of Shirley Chisholm and Diahann Carroll.
This year’s releases of “Joy Goddess: A’Lelia Walker and the Harlem Renaissance,” “A More Perfect Party: The Night Shirley Chisholm and Diahann Carroll Reshaped Politics,” and Williams’ “Toni at Random: The Iconic Writer’s Legendary Editorship” honor these women with a counter to decades of misinformation and lack of recognition – all the while reintroducing readers to some of the nation’s most pivotal changemakers.
“The marching order is first and foremost, accept history about Black people in this nation to be U.S. history, and to challenge anybody who’s trying to erase it,” Tolliver told The Informer ahead of her June District of Columbia Public Library author talk. “Shirley Chisholm is U.S. history, Diahann Carroll is U.S. history. I’m documenting that and it deserves to be right there; without it, this nation doesn’t exist.”
As September’s Black Reading Month unfolds— a month-long recognition for Black authors— check out these three novels celebrating truth, women empowerment, and the stroke of Morrison’s pen.
“You can’t put it back in the bottle–they’re trying to make it illegal and improper to tell these stories, and I’m just going to keep telling them,” Bundles told The Informer, “and I know that there are others like me who are committed to that as well.”
Correcting the Record on the 1920s ‘Joy Goddess’
As the great-granddaughter of A’leila Walker, daughter of African American entrepreneur Madam CJ Walker, Bundles took a personal note in correcting a legacy tainted with misconceptions.
Originally released on June 10, “Joy Goddess: A’Lelia Walker and the Harlem Renaissance” is the product of more than 50 years of research, drawn from private letters, family papers and firsthand recounts that attest to one of the leading figures of the 1920s and ’30s.
“Some of the most well-known books about the Harlem Renaissance really almost caricatured and diminished her,” Bundles said, highlighting common beliefs that Walker squandered her mother’s inheritance and “spent the ‘20s playing bridge.”
“While I would say that she enjoyed a good game of bridge and a good game of poker, that is not how she spent her life,” Bundles said with a laugh.
Born Leila Walker (prior to changing her name in 1922), the arts patron emerged as the founder and host of Dark Tower, a cultural salon where ideas flourished and worlds collided in a new age of Black liberation.
Among the list of regular attendees included household activists, artists, musicians and writers such as Zora Neale Hurston, W.E.B. Du Bois, James Weldon Johnson, and Langston Hughes, who dubbed the name of the 2025 novel when he attributed Walker as “the joy goddess of the 1920s.”
“[A’Lelia Walker] created a space where people could come together,” Bundles said, touting the Dark Tower as an “essential element” of the Harlem Renaissance. “Where her white friends from downtown and her Black friends from Uptown, where musicians and artists and writers and musicians met with African diplomats and European Royals. There really was nobody else who had quite the elements that she had to make this happen.”
Bundles exemplifies a common theme of misrepresentation in women’s history, pointing to her own great-great-grandmother, Madam CJ Walker, whom many attribute as the inventor of the hot comb–a falsity corrected by the historian through previous publications such as “Madam C.J. Walker: Entrepreneur;” “On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker;” and “Madam Walker Theatre Center: An Indianapolis Treasure.”
Thus, she touts the importance of women telling each other’s stories, lauding her own graduate school advisor, Phyllis Garland of the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, for encouraging the author to tap into her own lineage while circling a dissertation in 1975.
“It took someone else who understood and who valued Black women to tell me that the story that I had, that I was sitting on, was important,” Bundles shared. “In general, women’s stories have not been valued, but now there are two and three generations of women historians and journalists who want to tell our stories. It absolutely makes a difference when you see yourself in a book and when you can tell the sermon.”
Empowering Women Through a ‘More Perfect Party’
Tolliver also resonates with themes of sisterhood and leadership, as depicted through “A More Perfect Party: The Night Shirley Chisholm and Diahann Carroll Reshaped Politics.”
Following an interview with then-California Congressional Rep. Barbara Lee, now mayor of Oakland, Tolliver recognized some truths untold in the story of the first Black woman to run for president, including noting Lee’s support in securing the Black Panther Party’s endorsement.
Set to the backdrop of April 29, 1972, the book chronicles the night celebrated actress and singer Carroll, credited as the first Black woman to star in a network sitcom, hosted a fundraiser soiree for Chisholm’s presidential campaign. Each chapter takes a journey through the lens of party attendees, probing into the logic, documented actions and perspective of various individuals in an attempt to understand what led them there.
“I’m talking about people like Berry Gordy, Goldie Hawn, David Frost, individuals who [Carroll] invited into her home on that night in April 1972, and the beauty of what it meant,” said Tolliver, “for two women who carved through the steel of discrimination and sexism and racism in completely different fields.”
While capturing the breadth of Chisholm’s legacy beyond politics, the author says “A More Perfect Party” acts as a model to correct generational strife to women’s success.
She highlights Carroll’s support in a time where Chisholm was being denied space on the debate stage and “mocked and heckled” in coverage “if they chose to cover her at all,” while addressing the need to uplift young voices–such as Lee, who was a student at Mills College in 1972–and recognize what’s possible if “we listen to women, especially Black women…the first time we [say] things.”
“[Chisholm] was ahead of her time, calling for corporate money to get out of politics…calling for the creation of a national network of child care systems,” Tolliver explained. “She had ideas that were rejected to some degree because she–this petite, fearless Black woman–was the messenger.”
Additionally, Tolliver, a political analyst, noted a “surprising parallel” to the modern electoral reality, citing the 107-day presidential campaign of former Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024.
“Whether it was the attacks on identity that Chisholm faced compared to Vice President Harris, whether it was the lack of willingness by some to consider a woman a leader who was capable of leading this country, it was jarring,” Tolliver told The Informer. “But one thing that really shines in this text is that history provides guideposts for how we can shift and evolve our reactions in real time.”
Tolliver noted recognition for the generational power of storytelling and that “history is surrounding all of us,” adding hopes to see readers take away themes of authenticity and not compromising oneself “when it comes to the truth and values.”
The target ranges from emerging politicians and activists looking to challenge systems, to folks interested in serving others, reminding all to do so “consistently in the name of the people.”
“[Chisholm] wasn’t going to shrink herself or put on an act, whether that was in the halls of Congress or among these celebrities clinking champagne glasses…at Diahann Carroll’s home,” Tolliver said. “Be authentic and be clear. You can’t equivocate in those situations, in the situation we’re experiencing right now in this country.”
A Legacy Rooted in ‘Black Life, Black Culture‘
While Bundles and Tolliver work to correct historic records, Howard University’s Dean of the Graduate School Dana Williams is lending her admiration on expanding societal views–notably emphasizing why Morrison the editor, and not just the writer, deserves a spotlight in American history.
“If you think about fiction in the 1960s and ’70s, you can kind of characterize what the literature looked like as a function of its time…but [after the Black Arts Movement began to decline], somebody had to make those decisions to say, ‘These are the authors that we want to publish. This is the kind of literature that represents the full swath of African American life, literature and culture,’” said Williams, “and Morrison was one of those editors.”
“Toni at Random: The Iconic Writer’s Legendary Editorship” charts Morrison’s contributions to the broader literary landscape, chronicling her time as an editor for Random House Publishing Group, where she lended a hand in legendary works such as “Angela Davis: An Autobiography” (1974), Muhammad Ali’s 1975 “The Greatest: My Own Story,” among others.
An alumni and former professor of Howard University, Morrison’s ability to deepen cultural connections takes center stage through personal conversations and recounted memories, with Williams sharing that much of the story came directly from the source, who even gave the best-seller its title years before her death in 2019.
In reflecting on prevalent themes in the book, the dean exemplified Morrison’s strength in showing “Black people are not monolithic” through a diverse array of works. Further, she highlighted the value of historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs), attributing the “level of trust” and freedom in their exchanges to their institutional connections.
“I don’t think I could have written this book from anywhere else,” said Williams, who earned her master’s and Ph.D from Howard University. “I hope it will make clear to people…that she doesn’t emerge in a vacuum, but she emerges in a culture that’s rooted deeply in Black life and Black culture.”
After crediting Morrison for forging paths to “write for Black audiences without apology,” the African American literature scholar reflected on the muse as an advocate for all aspects of Black life, honing in on her ability to connect with institutions and networks “beyond her own writing.”
Similar to Bundles, who will be honoring the Dark Tower legacy amid D.C.’s March On! Film Festival (Sept. 15-21), Williams shared a desire to see people understand a deeper scope of someone she considers “one of the most remarkable novelists and thinkers of our time.”
“I hope [this book] will help us to think about [her] in a really rounded way,” Williams told The Informer. “To think about all of the things that come into the making of Toni Morrison.”
Meanwhile, Tolliver told The Informer readers can seek inspiration from authors challenging African American erasure from history, emphasizing “that there is no distinguishing difference” as its “all foundational to this nation.”
“Call it out, contest it and confront it at every turn,” Tolliver said. “Every single voice matters, and I want people to feel empowered to use their own.”