 W. E. B.Du Bois did not oppose the relationship between black writers and white publishers, but he was critical of works such as Claude McKay's bestselling novel "Home to Harlem" (1928) for appealing to the "prurient demand[s]" of white readers and publishers for portrayals of black "licentiousness".Langston Hughes spoke for most of the writers and artists when he wrote in his essay "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain" (1926) that black artists intended to express themselves freely, no matter what the black public or white public thought.