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Cover of The Fire in the Flint

Historical Fiction

The Fire in the Flint

An optimistic Black physician returns to his Georgia hometown where he must grapple with racial tensions he thought had faded.

First published
1924
Length
72,441 words
Reading time
About 5 hr 2 min
Language
English (UK)

About the book

Set in the Jim Crow South following World War I, The Fire in the Flint follows Dr. Kenneth Harper, a young, sometimes naive Black physician and war veteran. After graduating from a Northern medical school, he returns to his hometown of Central City, Georgia to start a practice. He arrives believing he can avoid discrimination by simply not getting involved with the town’s racial affairs—but he quickly finds out otherwise, and must confront the reality of living in a place where systemic racism and the Ku Klux Klan run rampant.

The Fire in the Flint , published in 1924, is American civil rights activist Walter White’s debut novel. Written during the height of the Harlem Renaissance—a period where African American literature flourished—White sought to promote anti-racist themes and showcase the oppression Black people faced in the early twentieth-century.

First published 1924; the Read4Max reading text contains approximately 72,441 words arranged in 26 navigable sections.

About the author

Walter White

Walter White (1939–?) is described by Wikidata as Indiana author 1939-.

Recorded occupations include writer. Open Library identifies Journals of Walter White as a leading work in its author record. Open Library catalogs 25 works under this author record. The Read4Max catalog currently includes The Fire in the Flint under Walter White's authorship.

Reading options

  • A complete text with direct section navigation in the browser reader.
  • A downloadable EPUB for phones, tablets, desktop reading apps, and compatible ereaders.
  • Book and contributor metadata are checked against the source edition before indexing.

Themes and ideas

  • Bildungsromans
  • Young men
  • Medical fiction
  • Race relations
  • Georgia
  • African American physicians

Table of contents

Open reader
Show all 26 sections
  1. Dedication
  2. Epigraph
  3. The Fire in the Flint
  4. I
  5. II
  6. III
  7. IV
  8. V
  9. VI
  10. VII
  11. VIII
  12. IX
  13. X
  14. XI
  15. XII
  16. XIII
  17. XIV
  18. XV
  19. XVI
  20. XVII
  21. XVIII
  22. XIX
  23. XX
  24. XXI
  25. XXII
  26. XXIII