nigger heaven

English

Noun

nigger heaven (plural nigger heavens)

1. (dated (chiefly 1870s), historical, offensive) The peanut gallery in a theatre.
   • 1911, William Carleton?, One Way Out: A Middle-Class New-Englander Emigrates to America, Small, Maynard & Company, page 8:

     It took close figuring to do anything but live that first year and yet we pushed our way with the crowd into the nigger heavens and saw most of the good shows. I had never been to the theatre before and I liked it.

   • 1965, Melvin Beaunorus Tolson, Harlem Gallery, volume 1, Twayne, page 53:

     The golden mean
     of the dark wayfarer's way between
     black Scylla and white Charybdis, I
     have traveled; subdued ifs in the way;
     from vile-canaille balconies and nigger heavens, seen
     day beasts and night beasts of prey
     in the disemboweling pits of
     Europe and America,
     in the death-worming bowels of
     Asia and Africa;
     and, although a Dumb Ox (like young Aquinas), I
     have not forgot
     the rainbows and the olive leaves against the orient sky.