Introduction -- Up from nature: racial uplift and ecological agencies in Booker T. Washington's autobiographies -- W. E. B. Du Bois at the Grand Canyon: nature, history, and race in A darkwater -- The crisis, the politics of nature, and the Harlem Renaissance: Effie Lee Newsome's eco-poetics -- Sawmills and swamps: ecological collectives in Zora Neale Hurston's Mules and men and Their eyes were watching God -- From black Marxism to industrial ecosystem: racial and ecological crisis in William Attaway's Blood on the forge -- Conclusion.