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Wallace Thurman’s novel Infants of the Spring (1932) is an extraordinary work offering insights into the Harlem Renaissance from the perspective of a key figure in a younger group who called themselves or were called the niggerati (also spelled “niggeratti”). The events and discussions in Infants of the Spring are all set in “Niggeratti Manor,” the home of the protagonist, Raymond Taylor-a meeting place of Harlem’s black bohemia. Most of the characters seem to be thinly veiled real-life figures, and Taylor is evidently Thurman’s persona. Similarly, the setting can be identified as Thurman’s home at 267 West 136th Street, where he lived from 1926 to 1928. Except for its top floor (where an actress with two daughters, and another tenant, lived), the house was offered to young African American writers and artists by a black businesswoman, Iolanthe Sidney. In order to help talented young black people, Sidney asked for only a very low rent-or none, when (as frequently happened) her tenants were unable to pay anything at all.