James Weldon Johnson: Author of “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing”
James Weldon Johnson was an African-American writer, who distinguished himself in civil rights, diplomacy, education, journalism, law, literature, and music. In 1900, Johnson wrote the...
Category : Authors & Poets
Sterling Allen Brown: Harlem Renaissance Poet
“I wanted to understand my people. I wanted to understand what it meant to be a [Black]. What the qualities of life were. With their...
Langston Hughes: Poet Laureate of the Black Race
I dream a world… where wretchedness will hang its head, and joy like a pearl, attends the needs of all mankind. Of such I dream,...
Phillis Wheatley: The first published African-American female poet
Phillis Wheatley was the first published African-American female poet. She was born in West Africa around 1753, before she was kidnapped and sold into the...
Gil Scott-Heron: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Gil Scott-Heron was the African American poet, novelist, musician, and songwriter known primarily for his work as a spoken-word performer in the 1970s and 1980s....
Harriet E. Wilson: The first female African-American novelist
Harriet E. Wilson is considered the first female African-American novelist, as well as the first African American of any gender to publish a novel on...
João da Cruz e Sousa: The “Black Swan”
Poet João da Cruz e Sousa, (November 24, 1861-March 19, 1898) was the leading figure of the Symbolist movement in Brazil. Called the Cisne Negro...
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper: The Mother of African American journalism
Frances E.W. Harper was a leading African-American poet and writer. She was also an ardent activist in the abolitionist and women’s rights movements. Harper had...
Claude McKay: Radical Poet
Claude McKay was a Jamaican-American poet best known for his radical sonnet “If We Must Die,” one of the most militant and enduring poems associated...
Georgia Douglas Johnson: The most famous woman poet of the Harlem Renaissance
Georgia Douglas Johnson was one of the earliest African-American female poets to gain widespread recognition. As part of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s, Johnson...