For as long as I can remember, I have been passionately intrigued by 'Africa,' by the word itself, by its flora and fauna, its topographical diversity and grandeur; but above all else, by the sheer variety of the colors of its people, from tan and sepia to jet and ebony.

ISBN 978-0-691-14234-0
with Kwame Anthony Appiah Encyclopedia of Africa: Two-Volume Set. 2007. W.

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Gates has hosted several PBS television miniseries including the history and travel program Wonders of the African World and the biographical African American Lives and Faces of America. (born September 16 1950) is an American literary critic educator scholar writer editor and public intellectual. B.