Article: Books that made a difference to Jesse L. Martin: the Law and Order actor is blown away by Shakespeare and Zora Neale Hurston, awed by Quincy Jones and Langston Hughes, and moved by great black history.(reading room)

AS A CHILD, I WAS FORTUNATE ENOUGH to be close to family members who were--and still are--great storytellers. I was a gullible country boy from Rocky Mount, Virginia, and I believed every folktale they told me, no matter how fantastic. I remember one called "The Letter Carrier." In it, small children are warned away from the letter box because that's where the mailman comes, and he's really a slave catcher who finds children and takes them farther down South to sell as slaves.

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It was our bogeyman story. It was our entertainment. And most important, it was a way to get us to go to bed. But these narratives also fostered a love of ...

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