THE MARTIN LUTHER, JR., COMPANION selected...

THE MARTIN LUTHER, JR., COMPANION selected by Coretta Scott King (St. Martin’s Press: $7.95; 108 pp., illustrated, paperback original) and WORDS TO MAKE MY DREAM COME TRUE: A Book of African American Quotations edited by Deirdre Mullane (Anchor: $14.95; 531 pp., paperback). Two new anthologies offer material for reading and reflection during Black History Month. Mullane has compiled the words of musicians, writers, actors, athletes and politicians, from former heavyweight champion Larry Holmes (“It’s hard being black. You ever been black? I was black once--when I was poor.”) to poet Maya Angelou (“If you’re for the right thing, then you do it without thinking.”) and educator Anna Julia Cooper (“The cause of freedom is not the cause of a race or a sect, a party or a class--it is the cause of humankind, the very birthright of humanity.”). As his family’s anthology demonstrates, Martin Luther King Jr., was one of the most eloquent orators of the 20th Century. Although most Americans know his “I Have a Dream” speech, “Companion” showcases his other clarion phrases: “If Western civilization does not now respond constructively to the challenge to banish racism, some future historian will have to say that a great civilization died because it lacked the soul and commitment to make justice a reality for all men.”