In Good Company: A Story in Black and White

by PaulDuFeu (Author), PaulDuFeu (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  1991

  $3.36

  Between 6.44 pm and 7.02 pm on 14 August 1971 Paul du Feu fell in love with a six-foot African American who had a powerful handshake and a seductive way of speaking his name. They didn't discuss marriage right away but it was definitely in the air, and two weeks later James Baldwin summoned them both to his home in the South of France intending, in loco parentis, to assess Paul's suitability as a husband for Maya Angelou. He passed, but right from the start Paul knew that their marriage would keep him on his toes. Having planned a rendezvous in San Francisco, they actually missed each other by about 3,000 miles - Maya was starring in a Broadway play and had forgotten to tell him. He was soon absorbed into Maya's African American extended family who affectionately enjoyed him as an amusing exotic - a bit of a shock for someone who had spent the first half of his life thinking he was in the mainstream and that it was other cultures and races who were a little eccentric. But after ten years, whether swilling wine in a Country and Western saloon or sipping it at a genteel Whitehouse reception, Paul could never really accept his fellow whites as they saw themselves. In Good Company is a warm, affectionate and aften extremely funny account of his life with Maya Angelou and is studded with a varied and entertaining cast including James Baldwin, Rip Torn, Germain Greer, Jessica Mitford and Nina Simone - even President Ford has a walk-on part.