Found 21 collections related to American poetry -- African American authors

Author, poet. Born in Jamaica. Correspondence and manuscripts of McKay's works, both published and unpublished, including "Banjo," "Banana Bottom," "Harlem Glory," and "Romance in Marseilles." Included are letters with Max Eastman, from Louise Bryant, Arrack Johns, director of the Federal Writers' Project, and to Carl Van Vechten, 1941. less

James Baldwin (1924-1987) was the premiere African American writer and public intellectual of the post-War period. He authored six novels, three plays, dozens of short stories, a book-length work of non-fiction, a children's book, scores of essays and reviews, and a book of poems. Baldwin won renown in the U.S. and internationally for his writing, his leadership in the civil rights movement, and for championing human rights around the world. His essays and reviews, especially, are remarkable not just for their mastery of literary technique - their marriage of music and sharp analysis - but for the breadth of the African American experience which they interpret, dramatize, honor, and lament. These prose masterpieces are unique in the history of American literature for the depth, subtlety, and daring with which they explore the psycho-political causes and consequences of racism and other ideologies of political exploitation. His best known works include Go Tell It on the Mountain(1953), Notes of a Native Son(1955), Giovanni's Room(1956), The Fire Next Time(1963), and If Beale Street Could Talk(1974). "Five Years" is an 18-page typescript of sixteen unpublished poems (the last two being carbons) written by Baldwin between 1942 and 1948 prior to the publication of his first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain. The poems, which are dated, explore themes of love, fear and mortality, lifelong preoccupations of the author best known for his insightful essays and probing fiction. less

Born Yves Francois Lubin in Haiti in 1957, Assotto Saint was a New York-based gay activist, poet, and performance artist who edited two anthologies of black gay poets in the early 1990s. He founded a publishing house, Galiens Press, which published his book of poems Stations and the anthologies Here to Dare and The Road Before Us. In addition, Saint also wrote and produced several theater pieces, including Risin' to the Love We Need and New Love Song. Saint was the founder and artistic director of Metamorphosis Theater and the lead singer of the rock band Xotica. He died of HIV-related diseases in 1994. The Assotto Saint papers consist of correspondence and writings by Saint, manuscripts and letters from authors featured in his anthologies as well as other gay writers, printed matter, and some personal papers. less

The collection contains poems recited in the film, contracts, newspaper ad layouts, advertisements, press releases, a press kit, foreign correspondence regarding theater inquiries, national and international reviews of the film, articles about the cast members and legal documents relating to the suit brought by Hassan, et al. less

Collection of research materials compiled by Sr. Mary Margaret, F.S.S.J., in preparation of her master's thesis on Countee Cullen and his work. The thesis was submitted to the English Department of St. Bonaventure University, St. Bonaventure, New York. The collection consists primarily of research materials, but includes letters to Sr. M. Margaret (1952-1961), including letters from Ida Cullen, Harold Jackman, and W.S. Braithwaite, and three incomplete copies of the thesis. less

Helene Johnson was one a poet of the Harlem Renaissance. She was born in Boston, Massachusetts. She attended Boston University and Columbia University, the latter in in New York City in 1926. Johnson was the youngest of the African American writers of the Harlem Renaissance. She published approximately twenty-five poems which appeared in such magazines as Opportunity, Fire!!, and Vanity Fair, as well as in The New Negro. Her writings were mainly concerned with life in the ghetto and a strong identification with her racial heritage. The Helene Johnson poems consist of more than thirty unpublished and undated poems, with corrections and revisions by Johnson. There are also photocopies of articles which mention Johnson as a Harlem Renaissance poet: "Frank Horne and the Second Echelon Poets of the Harlem Renaissance" from Arna Bontemps's The Harlem Renaissance Remembered, 1972; "Propaganda and Aesthetics: The Literary Politics of Afro-American Magazines in the 20th Century", 1979; and "The Unpublished Poems of Helene Johnson.". less

This collection consists of typescripts of novels, biographies, essays, and poems on historical, sociological, and educational issues, and conference papers. Some of the typescripts appear as final drafts, others as working drafts with author's annotations and corrections. Manuscripts included are "A Talk to Teachers: The Negro Child, His Self Image" by James Baldwin; "Slavery and Capitalism" by Eric Williams; "Life in a Haitian Valley" by Melville J. Herskovits; "American Dilemma" by Gunnar Myrdal; and poems by Waring Cuney, among others. Other authors represented are Arna Bontemps, Horace Mann Bond, Lloyd Brown, Helen Buckler, Henrietta Buckmaster, John H. Clark, Benjamin Davis, Ralph Ellison, Arthur Huff Fauset, and E. Franklin Frazier. Conference material includes Melville J. Herskovits and the Future of Africana Studies (Schomburg Center, May 1988); Marcus Garvey Centennial Conference (Jamaica, November 1987); and the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture (Nigeria, 1977). less

Poet, novelist, short story writer, playwright, lyricist, and author of juvenile books, Langston Hughes was one of the most prolific African-American writers of the 20th century. Born in Joplin, Missouri, Hughes came to New York in the 1920s and joined other writers and artists in creating what would become known as the Harlem Renaissance. The Langston Hughes collection: additions consists of material in a variety of formats by and about Hughes. less

The Melvin Dixon papers consist primarily of manuscripts, correspondence, notes, and journals reflecting his experiences as a black gay writer. Most of the collection is comprised of manuscript drafts of Dixon's published works "Trouble the Water," "Vanishing Rooms," "Ride Out the Wilderness," "Change of Territory," as well as drafts for incomplete novels and stories, the fiction he called "works in progress," and short stories, poetry and plays, both published and unpublished. In addition, there are drafts and other material for Dixon's translations of "The Collected Poetry by Leopold Sedar Senghor," Genevieve Fabre's "Drumbeats, Masks and Metaphors," and works by the Haitian writer Jacques Roumain. Some essays and academic papers he presented are also included in collection. less

Bernadine Oliver wrote poetry of which a sampling and some essays were published in two volumes: It Begins Softly (1980) and Seeds of Ourselves (1984) by Women for Racial and Economic Equality. Oliver was a founding member of the New York chapter of this organization. She was also published in an anthology, Leaving the Bough: 50 American Poets of the 80s (1982). Oliver studied at the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 1979 after she was stricken with multiple sclerosis in 1974 at the age of twenty-four. The Bernadine Oliver papers consist of handwritten, typed and published poems, prose, and sketches and drawings. Oliver's poems speak of life and its trials of personal and social injustices for working people, the unemployed and the young, as well as growth and change, and hope for the future. There are also a few letters, information regarding her memorial service, some biographical material, and notes. less

James Baldwin (1924-1987) was an African American novelist, essayist, intellectual, and activist, renowned as one of the world's most influential voices of the twentieth century. The James Baldwin audio collection consists of thirty-five audio recordings of mostly interviews and speeches given by Baldwin from the 1960s to 1980s. less

Born in Sweet Home, Arkansas, in 1934, Henry Dumas was an African American poet and short story writer, and the editor and publisher of several magazines, including Anthologist, Untitled, Hiram Poetry Review and Collection. Dumas was shot and killed in the New York City subway in 1968, by a white policeman. His work was published posthumously and is represented in many anthologies, including Black Fire edited by Imamu Amiri Baraka (1968). One typed letter signed to LeRoi Jones (1966), accompanied by a photocopied typescript of a short story "Fon" and original typescripts of seven poems: "Cutting Down to Size," Hold on, I'm Comin!" "Knock on Wood," "Mosaic Harlem," "New Game," "Discus" and "Uplight.". less

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000) was a poet, author, and teacher. The Gwendolyn Brooks collection contains eight signed documents by Gwendolyn Brooks. The collection consists of: one TLS commenting, as a member of the jury, on books nominated for the 1959 Thormod Monsen Award; one TLS to Van Allen Bradley announcing her retirement as a book reviewer at the age of fifty (1967), and one ALS to "Marshall," April 20, 1963. Writings by Brooks include one holograph excerpt from "The Sermon on the Warpland," n.d. and 4 undated typed poems: "Medgar Evers," "The Sermon on the Warpland," "Malcolm X : For Dudley Randall," and "Old Mary.". less

The Umbra Poets Workshop was a group of young African-American writers who met on New York City's Lower East Side from 1962 to 1965 to conduct readings and discuss writing and politics. The Umbra Poets Workshop collection consists of oral history interviews with fourteen of the poets along with letters relating to the formation of Umbra and Calvin Hernton's activities. less

The Larry Neal papers document his role as a writer/editor and seminal figure in the Black Arts Movement, and consist principally of Neal's diverse forms of writings, including essays, scripts, screenplays, poems, short stories, and anthologies. Published copies of some of his writings are included in the collection, as are writings by colleagues and publishers. less

Akasha Gloria Hull (born 1944) is a writer, poet, and Black feminist scholar. The Akasha Hull papers, mostly dating from the 1970s to the 2000s, document Hull's writing projects, including poetry and scholarly works, her involvement in the Combahee River Collective, and her academic career as a professor of literature and women's studies, primarily at the University of Delaware and University of California, Santa Cruz. less