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Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance
Langston Hughes 1925 Langston Hughes 1950s Harlem Flapper Girls
James Mercer Langston Hughes was born February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri. His parents divorced when he was a young child, and his father moved to Mexico. He was raised by his grandmother until he was thirteen, when he moved to Lincoln, Illinois, to live with his mother and her husband, before the family eventually settled in Cleveland, Ohio. It was in Lincoln that Hughes began writing poetry. After graduating from high school, he spent a year in Mexico followed by a year at Columbia University in New York City. During this time, he held odd jobs such as assistant cook, launderer, and busboy. He also travelled to Africa and Europe working as a seaman. In November 1924, he moved to Washington, D. C. Hughes’s first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, (Knopf, 1926) was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1926. He finished his college education at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania three years later. In 1930 his first novel, Not Without Laughter, (Knopf, 1930) won the Harmon gold medal for literature. Hughes, who claimed Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Carl Sandburg, and Walt Whitman as his primary influences, is particularly known for his insightful, colorful portrayals of black life in America from the twenties through the sixties. He wrote novels, short stories and plays, as well as poetry, and is also known for his engagement with the world of jazz and the influence it had on his writing, as in his book-length poem Montage of a Dream Deferred (Holt, 1951). His life and work were enormously important in shaping the artistic contributions of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. Unlike other notable black poets of the period—Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, and Countee Cullen—Hughes refused to differentiate between his personal experience and the common experience of black America. He wanted to tell the stories of his people in ways that reflected their actual culture, including both their suffering and their love of music, laughter, and language itself. The critic Donald B. Gibson noted in the introduction to Modern Black Poets: A Collection of Critical Essays (Prentice Hall, 1973) that Hughes “differed from most of his predecessors among black poets . . . in that he addressed his poetry to the people, specifically to black people. During the twenties when most American poets were turning inward, writing obscure and esoteric poetry to an ever decreasing audience of readers, Hughes was turning outward, using language and themes, attitudes and ideas familiar to anyone who had the ability simply to read . . . Until the time of his death, he spread his message humorously—though always seriously—to audiences throughout the country, having read his poetry to more people (possibly) than any other American poet.” In addition to leaving us a large body of poetic work, Hughes wrote eleven plays and countless works of prose, including the well-known “Simple” books: Simple Speaks His Mind, (Simon & Schuster, 1950); Simple Stakes a Claim, (Rinehart, 1957); Simple Takes a Wife, (Simon & Schuster, 1953); and Simple’s Uncle Sam (Hill and Wang, 1965). He edited the anthologies The Poetry of the Negro and The Book of Negro Folklore, wrote an acclaimed autobiography, The Big Sea (Knopf, 1940), and co-wrote the play Mule Bone (HarperCollins, 1991) with Zora Neale Hurston. Langston Hughes died of complications from prostate cancer on May 22, 1967, in New York City. In his memory, his residence at 20 East 127th Street in Harlem has been given landmark status by the New York City Preservation Commission, and East 127th Street has been renamed “Langston Hughes Place.”
© Academy of American Poets. Retrieved 21 March, 2018.
Web Resources: Print
- Biography (Britannica): https://www.britannica.com/biography/Langston-Hughes
- Biography (Biography Channel): https://www.biography.com/people/langston-hughes-9346313
- Biography (Academy of American Poets): https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/langston-hughes
- Biography (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes
- Biography (Poetry Foundation): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/langston-hughes
- Life and Career (Essay): http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/g_l/hughes/life.htm
- The Impact of Hughes: https://americannationaluniversity.wordpress.com/2009/11/28/langston-hughes-the-life-times-works-as-well-as-the-impact-of-a-versatile-african-american-writer/
- Impact and Importance (Howard University; has excellent bibliographical links): http://www.howard.edu/library/reference/guides/hughes/
Web Resources: Video
- Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance (Part of the “Crash Course Series”): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ir0URpI9nKQ
- Biography (Biography Channel): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inP76rkYUso
- Hughes and His Poetry (Library of Congress): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnpItYHdP8Q
- Hughes reads “Weary Blues” at University of British Columbia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uM7HSOwJw20
- Hughes at UCLA on Feb 16, 1967 (audio with pictures, photos, illustrations): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Px5hwNCs9ss
Recommended Reading
Arnold Rampersad (2-part biography); Laurie Leach (single-volume biography); David Lewis (Harlem Renaissance)
LANGSTON HUGHES BIBLIOGRAPHY
Poetry
- The Weary Blues. Knopf, 1926.
- Fine Clothes to the Jew. Knopf, 1927.
- The Negro Mother and Other Dramatic Recitations. N.Y.: Golden Stair Press, 1931.
- Dear Lovely Death. Amenia, N.Y.: Troutbeck Press, 1931.
- The Dream Keeper and Other Poems. Knopf, 1932.
- Scottsboro Limited: Four Poems and a Play. N.Y.: Golden Stair Press, 1932.
- A New Song. International Working Order, 1938.
- Shakespeare in Harlem. Knopf, 1942.
- Jim Crow's Last Stand. Atlanta: Negro Publication Society of America, 1943.
- Freedom's Plow. N.Y.: Musette Publishers, 1943.
- Fields of Wonder. Knopf, 1947.
- One-Way Ticket. Knopf, 1949.
- Montage of a Dream Deferred. Holt, 1951.
- Ask Your Mama: 12 Moods for Jazz. Knopf, 1961.
- The Panther and the Lash: Poems of Our Times, 1967, reprinted, Vintage Books, 1992.
- The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes. Knopf, 1994.
- The Block: Poems. N.Y.: Viking, 1995.
- Carol of the Brown King: Poems. N.Y.: Atheneum Books, 1997.
- The Pasteboard Bandit. N.Y.: Oxford University Press, 1997.
- Not Without Laughter. Knopf, 1930, reprinted, Macmillan, 1986.
- The Ways of White Folks. Knopf, 1934, reprinted, Random House, 1971.
- Simple Speaks His Mind. Simon & Schuster, 1950.
- Laughing to Keep from Crying. Holt, 1952.
- Simple Takes a Wife. Simon & Schuster, 1953.
- Simple Stakes a Claim. Rinehart, 1957.
- Tambourines to Glory. John Day, 1958, reprinted, Hill & Wang, 1970.
- Something in Common and Other Stories. Hill & Wang, 1963.
- Simple's Uncle Sam. Hill & Wang, 1965.
- The Return of Simple. Hill & Wang, 1994.
- Short Stories of Langston Hughes. Hill & Wang, 1996.
- A Negro Looks at Soviet Central Asia. Moscow and Leningrad: Co-operative Publishing Society of Foreign Workers in the U.S.S.R., 1934.
- The Big Sea: An Autobiography. Knopf, 1940, reprinted, Thunder's Mouth, 1986.
- (With Roy De Carava) The Sweet Flypaper of Life. Simon & Schuster, 1955, reprinted Howard University Press, 1985.
- I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey. Rinehart, 1956, reprinted, Thunder's Mouth, 1986.
- (With Milton Meltzer) A Pictorial History of the Negro in America. Crown, 1956. 4th Edition published as A Pictorial History of Black Americans, 1973. 6th Edition published as A Pictorial History of African Americans, 1995.
- Fight for Freedom: The Story of the NAACP. Norton, 1962.
- (With Meltzer) Black Magic: A Pictorial History of the Negro in American Entertainment. Prentice-Hall, 1967.
- Black Misery. Paul S. Erickson, 1969, reprinted, Oxford University Press, 1994.
- Song Lyrics for the Broadway Musical Street Scene (1947) music by Kurt Weill; play by Elmer Rice.
- The Langston Hughes Reader. New York: Braziller, 1958.
- Simply Heavenly. Book and lyrics by Hughes, music by David Martin. New York: Dramatists Play Service, 1959.
- The Ballad of the Brown King. Libretto by Hughes, music by Margaret Bonds. New York: Sam Fox, 1961.
- Five Plays by Langston Hughes. Edited by Webster Smalley. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1963.
- Good Morning Revolution: Uncollected Social Protest Writings by Langston Hughes. Edited by Faith Berry. New York & Westport: Lawrence Hill, 1973.
- (With Arna Bontemps) Popo and Fifina: Children of Haiti. Macmillan, 1932, reprinted, Oxford University Press, 1993.
- The First Book of Rhythms. F. Watts, 1954, also published as The Book of Rhythms, Oxford University Press, 1995.
- The First Book of the Negroes, 1952
- The First Book of Jazz, 1954
- Marian Anderson: Famous Concert Singer, with Steven C. Tracy, 1954
- The First Book of the West Indies, 1956
- First Book of Africa, 1964
- Black Misery, illustrated by Arouni, 1969; reprinted 1994, Oxford University Press.
STREET SCENE (1947)
WHAT GOOD WOULD THE MOON BE?I’ve looked in the windows at diamonds,They’re beautiful, but they’re cold.I’ve seen Broadway stars in fur coatsThat cost a fortune, so I’m told.
I guess I’d look nice in diamonds,And sables might add to my charms,But if someone I don’t care for should buy them,I’d rather have two loving arms.
What good would the moon beUnless the right one shared its beams?What good would dreams-come-true beIf love wasn’t in those dreams? And a primrose path?What would be the funOf walking down a path like thatWithout the right one?
What good would the night beUnless the right lips whisper low,“Kiss me oh darling kiss me,”While evening stars still glow?
No it won’t be a primrose path for me,No it won’t be diamonds and gold,But maybe it will beSomeone who'll love me,Someone who'll love just meTo have and to hold.
- LONELY HOUSE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hD1R1HDRgc
- WHAT GOOD WOULD THE MOON BE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyXBCWWjx-M
- WHAT GOOD OULD THE MOON BE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cgRCM5SaKE
- A BOY LIKE YOU (Lotte Lenya): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u70k_QjyIUE
WHAT GOOD WOULD THE MOON BE?I’ve looked in the windows at diamonds,They’re beautiful, but they’re cold.I’ve seen Broadway stars in fur coatsThat cost a fortune, so I’m told.
I guess I’d look nice in diamonds,And sables might add to my charms,But if someone I don’t care for should buy them,I’d rather have two loving arms.
What good would the moon beUnless the right one shared its beams?What good would dreams-come-true beIf love wasn’t in those dreams? And a primrose path?What would be the funOf walking down a path like thatWithout the right one?
What good would the night beUnless the right lips whisper low,“Kiss me oh darling kiss me,”While evening stars still glow?
No it won’t be a primrose path for me,No it won’t be diamonds and gold,But maybe it will beSomeone who'll love me,Someone who'll love just meTo have and to hold.
Prominent Harlem Renaissance publications
The Harlem Renaissance was the development of the Harlem neighborhood in New York City as a black cultural mecca in the early 20th Century and the subsequent social and artistic explosion that resulted. Lasting roughly from the 1910s through the mid-1930s, the period is considered a golden age in African American culture, manifesting in literature, music, stage performance and art.
Great Migration The northern Manhattan neighborhood of Harlem was meant to be an upper-class white neighborhood in the 1880s, but rapid overdevelopment led to empty buildings and desperate landlords seeking to fill them. In the early 1900s, a few middle-class black families from another neighborhood known as Black Bohemia moved to Harlem, and other black families followed. Some white residents initially fought to keep African Americans out of the area, but failing that many whites eventually fled. Outside factors led to a population boom: From 1910 to 1920, African American populations migrated in large numbers from the South to the North, with prominent figures like W.E.B. Du Bois leading what became known as the Great Migration. In 1915 and 1916, natural disasters in the south put black workers and sharecroppers out of work. Additionally, during and after World War I, immigration to the United States fell, and northern recruiters headed south to entice black workers to their companies. By 1920, some 300,000 African Americans from the South had moved north, and Harlem was one of the most popular destinations for these families.
Langston Hughes This considerable population shift resulted in a Black Pride movement with leaders like Du Bois working to ensure that black Americans got the credit they deserved for cultural areas of life. Two of the earliest breakthroughs were in poetry, with Claude McKay’s collection Harlem Shadows in 1922 and Jean Toomer’s Cane in 1923. Novelist and du Bois protege Jessi Redmond Fauset’s 1924 novel There Is Confusion explored the idea of black Americans finding a cultural identity in a white-dominated Manhattan. Fauset was literary editor of the NAACP magazine The Crisis and developed a magazine for black children with Du Bois. The debut event of Fauset’s novel was engineered for a larger purpose by sociologist Charles Spurgeon Johnson, who was integral in shaping the Harlem literary scene. Johnson used the novel’s debut party to organize resources to create Opportunity, the National Urban League magazine he founded and edited, a success that bolstered writers like Langston Hughes. Hughes was at that party along with other promising black writers and editors, as well as powerful white New York publishing figures. Soon many writers found their work appearing in mainstream magazines like Harper’s.
Zora Neal Hurston Anthropologist and folklorist Zora Neal Hurston courted controversy through her involvement with a publication called FIRE!! Helmed by white author and Harlem writers’ patron Carl Van Vechten, the magazine exoticized the lives of Harlem residents. Van Vechten’s previous fiction stirred up interest among whites to visit Harlem and take advantage of the cultural and night life there. Though Van Vechten’s work was condemned by older luminaries like DuBois, it was embraced by Hurston, Hughes and others.
Louis Armstrong The music that percolated in and then boomed out of Harlem in the 1920s was jazz, often played at speakeasies offering illegal liquor. Jazz became a great draw for not only Harlem residents, but outside white audiences also. Some of the most celebrated names in American music regularly performed in Harlem—Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Bessie Smith, Fats Waller and Cab Calloway, often accompanied by elaborate floor shows. Tap dancers like John Bubbles and Bill “Bojangles” Robinson were also popular.
Cotton Club With the groundbreaking new music came a vibrant nightlife. The Savoy opened in 1927, an integrated ballroom with two bandstands that featured continuous jazz and dancing well past midnight, sometimes in the form of battling bands helmed by Fletcher Henderson, Jimmie Lunceford and King Oliver. While it was fashionable to frequent Harlem nightlife, entrepreneurs realized that some white people wanted to experience black culture without having to socialize with African Americans and created clubs to cater to them. The most successful of these was the Cotton Club, which featured frequent performances by Ellington and Calloway. Some in the community derided the existence of such clubs, while others believed they were a sign that black culture was moving towards greater acceptance.
Paul Robeson The cultural boom in Harlem gave black actors opportunities for stage work that had previously been withheld. Traditionally, if black actors appeared onstage, it was in a minstrel show musical and rarely in a serious drama with non-stereotypical roles. At the center of this stage revolution was the versatile Paul Robeson, an actor, singer, writer, activist, and more. Robeson first moved to Harlem in 1919 while studying law at Columbia University and continually maintained a social presence in the area, where he was considered an inspirational but approachable figure. Robeson believed that arts and culture were the best paths forward for Black Americans to overcome racism and make advances in a white-dominated culture.
Josephine Baker Black musical revues were staples in Harlem, and by the mid-1920s had moved south to Broadway, expanding into the white world. One of the earliest of these was Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle’s Shuffle Along, which launched the career of Josephine Baker. White patron Van Vechten helped bring more serious black stage work to Broadway, though largely the work of white authors and considered to fall short of the potential. It wasn’t until 1929 that a black-authored play about black lives, Wallace Thurman and William Rapp’s Harlem, played Broadway. Playwright Willis Richardson offered more serious opportunities for black actors with a several one-act plays written in the 1920s, as well as articles in Opportunity magazine outlining his goals. Stock companies like the Krigwa Players and the Harlem Experimental Theater also gave black actors serious roles.
Aaron Douglas The visual arts were never welcoming to black artists, with art schools, galleries and museums shutting them out. Sculptor Meta Warrick Fuller, a protege of Auguste Rodin, explored African American themes in her work and influenced Du Bois to champion black visual artists. The most celebrated Harlem Renaissance artist is Aaron Douglas, often called as “the Father of Black American Art,” who adapted African techniques to realize paintings and murals, as well as book illustration. Sculptor Augusta Savage’s 1923 bust of Du Bois garnered considerable attention. She followed that up with small, clay portraits of everyday African Americans, and would later be pivotal enlisting black artists into the Federal Art Project, a division of the Work Progress Administration (WPA). James VanDerZee’s photography captured Harlem daily life, as well as by commissioned portraits in his studio that he worked to fill with optimism and separate philosophically from the horrors of the past.
Harlem Renaissance Ends The end of Harlem’s creative boom began with the stock market crash of 1929 and wavered until Prohibition ended in 1933, which meant white patrons no longer sought out the illegal alcohol in uptown clubs. By 1935 many pivotal Harlem residents had moved on seeking work, replaced by the continuous flow of refugees from the South, many requiring public assistance. That same year, a riot broke out following the arrest of a young shoplifter, resulting in three dead, hundreds injured, and millions of dollars in property damage, as well as serving as a marker of the end of the Harlem Renaissance.
Langston Hughes This considerable population shift resulted in a Black Pride movement with leaders like Du Bois working to ensure that black Americans got the credit they deserved for cultural areas of life. Two of the earliest breakthroughs were in poetry, with Claude McKay’s collection Harlem Shadows in 1922 and Jean Toomer’s Cane in 1923. Novelist and du Bois protege Jessi Redmond Fauset’s 1924 novel There Is Confusion explored the idea of black Americans finding a cultural identity in a white-dominated Manhattan. Fauset was literary editor of the NAACP magazine The Crisis and developed a magazine for black children with Du Bois. The debut event of Fauset’s novel was engineered for a larger purpose by sociologist Charles Spurgeon Johnson, who was integral in shaping the Harlem literary scene. Johnson used the novel’s debut party to organize resources to create Opportunity, the National Urban League magazine he founded and edited, a success that bolstered writers like Langston Hughes. Hughes was at that party along with other promising black writers and editors, as well as powerful white New York publishing figures. Soon many writers found their work appearing in mainstream magazines like Harper’s.
Zora Neal Hurston Anthropologist and folklorist Zora Neal Hurston courted controversy through her involvement with a publication called FIRE!! Helmed by white author and Harlem writers’ patron Carl Van Vechten, the magazine exoticized the lives of Harlem residents. Van Vechten’s previous fiction stirred up interest among whites to visit Harlem and take advantage of the cultural and night life there. Though Van Vechten’s work was condemned by older luminaries like DuBois, it was embraced by Hurston, Hughes and others.
Louis Armstrong The music that percolated in and then boomed out of Harlem in the 1920s was jazz, often played at speakeasies offering illegal liquor. Jazz became a great draw for not only Harlem residents, but outside white audiences also. Some of the most celebrated names in American music regularly performed in Harlem—Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Bessie Smith, Fats Waller and Cab Calloway, often accompanied by elaborate floor shows. Tap dancers like John Bubbles and Bill “Bojangles” Robinson were also popular.
Cotton Club With the groundbreaking new music came a vibrant nightlife. The Savoy opened in 1927, an integrated ballroom with two bandstands that featured continuous jazz and dancing well past midnight, sometimes in the form of battling bands helmed by Fletcher Henderson, Jimmie Lunceford and King Oliver. While it was fashionable to frequent Harlem nightlife, entrepreneurs realized that some white people wanted to experience black culture without having to socialize with African Americans and created clubs to cater to them. The most successful of these was the Cotton Club, which featured frequent performances by Ellington and Calloway. Some in the community derided the existence of such clubs, while others believed they were a sign that black culture was moving towards greater acceptance.
Paul Robeson The cultural boom in Harlem gave black actors opportunities for stage work that had previously been withheld. Traditionally, if black actors appeared onstage, it was in a minstrel show musical and rarely in a serious drama with non-stereotypical roles. At the center of this stage revolution was the versatile Paul Robeson, an actor, singer, writer, activist, and more. Robeson first moved to Harlem in 1919 while studying law at Columbia University and continually maintained a social presence in the area, where he was considered an inspirational but approachable figure. Robeson believed that arts and culture were the best paths forward for Black Americans to overcome racism and make advances in a white-dominated culture.
Josephine Baker Black musical revues were staples in Harlem, and by the mid-1920s had moved south to Broadway, expanding into the white world. One of the earliest of these was Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle’s Shuffle Along, which launched the career of Josephine Baker. White patron Van Vechten helped bring more serious black stage work to Broadway, though largely the work of white authors and considered to fall short of the potential. It wasn’t until 1929 that a black-authored play about black lives, Wallace Thurman and William Rapp’s Harlem, played Broadway. Playwright Willis Richardson offered more serious opportunities for black actors with a several one-act plays written in the 1920s, as well as articles in Opportunity magazine outlining his goals. Stock companies like the Krigwa Players and the Harlem Experimental Theater also gave black actors serious roles.
Aaron Douglas The visual arts were never welcoming to black artists, with art schools, galleries and museums shutting them out. Sculptor Meta Warrick Fuller, a protege of Auguste Rodin, explored African American themes in her work and influenced Du Bois to champion black visual artists. The most celebrated Harlem Renaissance artist is Aaron Douglas, often called as “the Father of Black American Art,” who adapted African techniques to realize paintings and murals, as well as book illustration. Sculptor Augusta Savage’s 1923 bust of Du Bois garnered considerable attention. She followed that up with small, clay portraits of everyday African Americans, and would later be pivotal enlisting black artists into the Federal Art Project, a division of the Work Progress Administration (WPA). James VanDerZee’s photography captured Harlem daily life, as well as by commissioned portraits in his studio that he worked to fill with optimism and separate philosophically from the horrors of the past.
Harlem Renaissance Ends The end of Harlem’s creative boom began with the stock market crash of 1929 and wavered until Prohibition ended in 1933, which meant white patrons no longer sought out the illegal alcohol in uptown clubs. By 1935 many pivotal Harlem residents had moved on seeking work, replaced by the continuous flow of refugees from the South, many requiring public assistance. That same year, a riot broke out following the arrest of a young shoplifter, resulting in three dead, hundreds injured, and millions of dollars in property damage, as well as serving as a marker of the end of the Harlem Renaissance.
WEB RESOURCES
JOURNALS AND MAGAZINES:FIRE!! (background): https://www.britannica.com/topic/Fire-American-magazineFIRE!! (the complete first issue): https://issuu.com/poczineproject/docs/poczp_fire_1926_readviewTHE FOUR MAIN MAGAZINES: https://www.thoughtco.com/four-publications-of-the-harlem-renaissance-45158OPPORTUNITY: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Opportunity-American-magazineCRISIS (access to every issue): http://www.modjourn.org/render.php?view=mjp_object&id=crisiscollectionMESSENGER: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Messenger_(magazine)NEGRO WORLD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_World
HARLEM RENAISSANCE TIME LINE:1. LONG WHARF THEATER (Time line produced in association with its production of AIN'T MISBEHAVIN'): https://www.longwharf.org/aint-misbehavin-harlem-renaissance-time-line2. LITERARY TIME LINE: https://www.thoughtco.com/literary-timeline-of-harlem-renaissance-454203. OVERVIEW VISUAL TIMELINE: https://prezi.com/ycpaqdglznwi/timeline-1917-1935-the-jazz-age-the-harlem-renaissance/ ARTICLES, RESEARCH:Overview (History Channel): https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/harlem-renaissance Overview (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlem_Renaissance Overview (Britannica): https://www.britannica.com/event/Harlem-Renaissance-American-literature-and-art Harlem Renaissance and Poetry (Poetry Foundation): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/harlem-renaissance Harlem Renaissance and Poetry (Academy of American Poets): https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/text/brief-guide-harlem-renaissance MUSIC (University of Southern California): http://scalar.usc.edu/works/harlem-renaissance/music-from-the-harlem-renaissance ART (Harlem Renaissance Website): https://historyoftheharlemrenaissance.weebly.com/artists.html ART (University of Southern California): http://scalar.usc.edu/works/harlem-renaissance/artists LITERATURE: (University of Southern California): http://scalar.usc.edu/works/harlem-renaissance/writers SIGNIFICANCE (Humanities Texas): http://www.humanitiestexas.org/news/articles/harlem-renaissance-what-was-it-and-why-does-it-matter
VIDEO RESOURCES:Overview (PBS): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3ozfYC9CZE Overview (History Brief): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90PTxdsqfsA Overview (National History Day short documentary): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAN42382vxo Overview (C-Span with Emily Bernard speaking about her book Remember me to Harlem): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgBKqbnrFF8
HARLEM RENAISSANCE TIME LINE:1. LONG WHARF THEATER (Time line produced in association with its production of AIN'T MISBEHAVIN'): https://www.longwharf.org/aint-misbehavin-harlem-renaissance-time-line2. LITERARY TIME LINE: https://www.thoughtco.com/literary-timeline-of-harlem-renaissance-454203. OVERVIEW VISUAL TIMELINE: https://prezi.com/ycpaqdglznwi/timeline-1917-1935-the-jazz-age-the-harlem-renaissance/ ARTICLES, RESEARCH:Overview (History Channel): https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/harlem-renaissance Overview (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlem_Renaissance Overview (Britannica): https://www.britannica.com/event/Harlem-Renaissance-American-literature-and-art Harlem Renaissance and Poetry (Poetry Foundation): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/harlem-renaissance Harlem Renaissance and Poetry (Academy of American Poets): https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/text/brief-guide-harlem-renaissance MUSIC (University of Southern California): http://scalar.usc.edu/works/harlem-renaissance/music-from-the-harlem-renaissance ART (Harlem Renaissance Website): https://historyoftheharlemrenaissance.weebly.com/artists.html ART (University of Southern California): http://scalar.usc.edu/works/harlem-renaissance/artists LITERATURE: (University of Southern California): http://scalar.usc.edu/works/harlem-renaissance/writers SIGNIFICANCE (Humanities Texas): http://www.humanitiestexas.org/news/articles/harlem-renaissance-what-was-it-and-why-does-it-matter
VIDEO RESOURCES:Overview (PBS): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3ozfYC9CZE Overview (History Brief): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90PTxdsqfsA Overview (National History Day short documentary): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAN42382vxo Overview (C-Span with Emily Bernard speaking about her book Remember me to Harlem): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgBKqbnrFF8
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Duke Ellington 125th Street in Harlem
The Schomburg Center
The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture is a research library of the New York Public Library (NYPL) and an archive repository for information on people of African descent worldwide. Located at 515 Malcolm X Boulevard (Lenox Avenue) between West 135th and 136th Streets in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, it has, almost from its inception, been an integral part of the Harlem community. It is named for Afro-Puerto Rican scholar Arturo Alfonso Schomburg. The resources of the Center are broken up into five divisions, the Art and Artifacts Division, the Jean Blackwell Hutson General Research and Reference Division, the Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, the Moving Image and Recorded Sound Division, and the Photographs and Prints Division. In addition to research services, the center hosts readings, discussions, art exhibitions, and theatrical events. It is open to the general public.
WEBSITE: https://www.nypl.org/locations/schomburgHISTORY OF CENTER: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schomburg_Center_for_Research_in_Black_CultureARTURO SCHOMBURG: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arturo_Alfonso_Schomburg
Langston Hughes and James Baldwin
Baldwin on Hughes: “Every time I read Langston Hughes I am amazed all over again by his genuine gifts--and depressed that he has done so little with them.”
- NY TIMES: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/books/when-james-baldwin-and-langston-hughes-reviewed-each-other.html
- BALDWIN ON HUGHES: https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/98/03/29/specials/baldwin-hughes.html
- HUGHES ON BALDWIN: https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/98/03/29/specials/baldwin-native.html
LANGSTON HUGHES POETRY
© 1994 by The Estate of Langston Hughes.Source: The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes (Vintage Books, 1995)
THE NEGRO SPEAKS OF RIVERS1921
I’ve known rivers:I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset.
I’ve known rivers:Ancient, dusky rivers.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
________________________________________________________________________________________NEGRO1922
I am a Negro:Black as the night is black,Black like the depths of my Africa.
I’ve been a slave:Caesar told me to keep his door-steps clean.I brushed the boots of Washington.
I’ve been a worker:Under my hand the pyramids arose.I made mortar for the Woolworth Building.
I’ve been a singer:All the way from Africa to GeorgiaI carried my sorrow songs.I made ragtime.
I’ve been a victim:The Belgians cut off my hands in the Congo.They lynch me still in Mississippi.
I am a Negro:Black as the night is black,Black like the depths of my Africa.
_________________________________________________________________________________________THE WEARY BLUES1925
Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon, I heard a Negro play.Down on Lenox Avenue the other nightBy the pale dull pallor of an old gas light He did a lazy sway . . . He did a lazy sway . . .To the tune o’ those Weary Blues.With his ebony hands on each ivory keyHe made that poor piano moan with melody. O Blues!Swaying to and fro on his rickety stoolHe played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool. Sweet Blues!Coming from a black man’s soul. O Blues!In a deep song voice with a melancholy toneI heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan— “Ain’t got nobody in all this world, Ain’t got nobody but ma self. I’s gwine to quit ma frownin’ And put ma troubles on the shelf.”
Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.He played a few chords then he sang some more— “I got the Weary Blues And I can’t be satisfied. Got the Weary Blues And can’t be satisfied— I ain’t happy no mo’ And I wish that I had died.”And far into the night he crooned that tune.The stars went out and so did the moon.The singer stopped playing and went to bedWhile the Weary Blues echoed through his head.He slept like a rock or a man that’s dead.
____________________________________________________________________________________________ THE NEGRO MOTHER1931, 1940, 1959
Children, I come back todayTo tell you a story of the long dark wayThat I had to climb, that I had to knowIn order that the race might live and grow.Look at my face - dark as the night -Yet shining like the sun with love's true light.I am the dark girl who crossed the red seaCarrying in my body the seed of the free.I am the woman who worked in the fieldBringing the cotton and the corn to yield.I am the one who labored as a slave,Beaten and mistreated for the work that I gave -Children sold away from me, I'm husband sold, too.No safety, no love, no respect was I due.
Three hundred years in the deepest South:But God put a song and a prayer in my mouth.God put a dream like steel in my soul.Now, through my children, I'm reaching the goal.
Now, through my children, young and free,I realized the blessing deed to me.I couldn't read then. I couldn't write.I had nothing, back there in the night.Sometimes, the valley was filled with tears,But I kept trudging on through the lonely years.Sometimes, the road was hot with the sun,But I had to keep on till my work was done:I had to keep on! No stopping for me -I was the seed of the coming Free.I nourished the dream that nothing could smotherDeep in my breast - the Negro mother.I had only hope then, but now through you,Dark ones of today, my dreams must come true:All you dark children in the world out there,Remember my sweat, my pain, my despair.Remember my years, heavy with sorrow -And make of those years a torch for tomorrow.Make of my path a road to the lightOut of the darkness, the ignorance, the night.Lift high my banner out of the dust.Stand like free men supporting my trust.Believe in the right, let none push you back.Remember the whip and the slaver's track.Remember how the [masters] in struggle and strifeStill bar you the way, and deny you life -But march ever forward, breaking down bars.Look ever upward at the sun and the stars.Oh, my dark children, may my dreams and my prayersImpel you forever up the great stairs -For I will be with you till no white brotherDares keep down the children of the Negro Mother.
_______________________________________________________________________________________ GOOD MORNING REVOLUTION1932
Good morning Revolution: You are the best friend I ever had. We gonna pal around together from now on. Say, listen, Revolution: You know the boss where I used to work, The guy that gimme the air to cut expenses, He wrote a long letter to the papers about you: Said you was a trouble maker, a alien-enemy, In other words a son-of-a-bitch. He called up the police And told’em to watch out for a guy Named Revolution
You see, The boss knows you are my friend. He sees us hanging out together He knows we’re hungry and ragged, And ain’t got a damn thing in this world – And are gonna to do something about it.
The boss got all his needs, certainly, Eats swell, Owns a lotta houses, Goes vacationin’, Breaks strikes, Runs politics, bribes police Pays off congress And struts all over earth –
But me, I ain’t never had enough to eat. Me, I ain’t never been warm in winter. Me, I ain’t never known security – All my life, been livin’ hand to mouth Hand to mouth.
Listen, Revolution, We’re buddies, see – Together, We can take everything: Factories, arsenals, houses, ships, Railroads, forests, fields, orchards, Bus lines, telegraphs, radios, (Jesus! Raise hell with radios!) Steel mills, coal mines, oil wells, gas, All the tools of production. (Great day in the morning!) Everything – And turn’em over to the people who work. Rule and run’em for us people who work.
Boy! Them radios! Broadcasting that very first morning [of the Revolution] to the USSR: Another member of the International Soviet’s done come. Greetings to the Socialist Soviet Republics Hey you rising workers everywhere--Greetings – And we’ll sign it: Germany Sign it: China Sign it: Africa Sign it: Italy Sign it: America Sign it with my one name: Worker On that day when no one will be hungry, cold oppressed, Anywhere in the world again.
That’s our job!
I been starvin’ too long Ain’t you?
Let’s go, Revolution!
____________________________________________________________________________________ LET AMERICA BE AMERICA AGAIN1936
Let America be America again.Let it be the dream it used to be.Let it be the pioneer on the plainSeeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—Let it be that great strong land of loveWhere never kings connive nor tyrants schemeThat any man be crushed by one above.
(It never was America to me.)
O, let my land be a land where LibertyIs crowned with no false patriotic wreath,But opportunity is real, and life is free,Equality is in the air we breathe.
(There’s never been equality for me,Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark? And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.I am the red man driven from the land,I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—And finding only the same old stupid planOf dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
I am the young man, full of strength and hope,Tangled in that ancient endless chainOf profit, power, gain, of grab the land!Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!Of work the men! Of take the pay!Of owning everything for one’s own greed!
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.I am the worker sold to the machine.I am the Negro, servant to you all.I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—Hungry yet today despite the dream.Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!I am the man who never got ahead,The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dreamIn the Old World while still a serf of kings,Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,That even yet its mighty daring singsIn every brick and stone, in every furrow turnedThat’s made America the land it has become.O, I’m the man who sailed those early seasIn search of what I meant to be my home—For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,And torn from Black Africa’s strand I cameTo build a “homeland of the free.”
The free?
Who said the free? Not me?Surely not me? The millions on relief today?The millions shot down when we strike?The millions who have nothing for our pay?For all the dreams we’ve dreamedAnd all the songs we’ve sungAnd all the hopes we’ve heldAnd all the flags we’ve hung,The millions who have nothing for our pay—Except the dream that’s almost dead today.
O, let America be America again—The land that never has been yet—And yet must be—the land where every man is free.The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—Who made America,Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—The steel of freedom does not stain.From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,We must take back our land again,America!
O, yes,I say it plain,America never was America to me,And yet I swear this oath—America will be!
Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,We, the people, must redeemThe land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.The mountains and the endless plain—All, all the stretch of these great green states—And make America again!
______________________________________________________________________________________ FREEDOM TRAINNew Republic version 1947 (revised and expanded in 1959)
I read in the papers about the Freedom TrainI heard on the radio about the Freedom TrainI seen folks talking about the Freedom TrainLord, I've been a-waitin for the Freedom Train!Washington, Richmond, Durham, Chatanooga, AtlantaWay cross Georgia.Lord, Lord, Lordway down in Dixie the only trains I see'sGot a Jim-Crow coaches set aside for me.I hope their ain't no Jim Crow on the Freedom Train,No back door entrance to the Freedom Train,No sign FOR COLORED on the Freedom Train,No WHITE FOLKS ONLY on the Freedom Train.I'm gonna check up.I'm gonna to check up on thisFreedom Train.Who is the engineer on the Freedom Train?Can a coal-black man drive the Freedom Train?Or am I still a porter on the Freedom Train?Is there ballot boxes on the Freedom Train?Do colored folks vote on the Freedom Train?When it stops in Mississippi, will it be made plainEverybody's got a right to board the Freedom Train?I'm gonna check up.I'm gonna to check up on thisFreedom Train.The Birmingham station's marked COLORED and WHITE.The white folks go leftThe colored go right.They even got a segregated lane.Is that the way to get aboard the Freedom Train?I'm gonna check up.I'm gonna to check up on thisFreedom Train.If my children ask me, Daddy, please explainWhy a Jim Crow stations for the Freedom Train?What shall I tell my children?You tell me, cause freedom ain't freedom when a man ain't free.My brother named Jimmy died at AnzioHe died for real, and it wasn't no show.Is this here freedom on the Freedom Train really freedom or a show again?Now let the Freedom Train come zooming down the trackGleaming in the sunlight for white and blackNot stoppin' at no stations marked COLORED nor WHITE,Just stoppin' in the fields in the broad daylight,Stoppin' in the country in the wide-open airWhere there never was a Jim Crow sign nowhere,And No Lilly-White Committees, politicians of note,Nor poll tax layer through which colored can't voteAnd there won't be no kinda color linesThe Freedom Train will be yoursAnd mine.Then maybe from their graves in AnzioBlack men and white will say, We want it so!Black men and white will say, Ain't it fine?At home they got a Freedom train,A Freedom train,That's yours and mine!
_________________________________________________________________________________ THEME FOR ENGLISH B1949, 1951
The instructor said,
Go home and write a page tonight. And let that page come out of you— Then, it will be true.
I wonder if it’s that simple?I am twenty-two, colored, born in Winston-Salem. I went to school there, then Durham, then here to this college on the hill above Harlem. I am the only colored student in my class. The steps from the hill lead down into Harlem, through a park, then I cross St. Nicholas, Eighth Avenue, Seventh, and I come to the Y, the Harlem Branch Y, where I take the elevator up to my room, sit down, and write this page:
It’s not easy to know what is true for you or me at twenty-two, my age. But I guess I’m whatI feel and see and hear, Harlem, I hear you.hear you, hear me—we two—you, me, talk on this page. (I hear New York, too.) Me—who?
Well, I like to eat, sleep, drink, and be in love. I like to work, read, learn, and understand life. I like a pipe for a Christmas present,or records—Bessie, bop, or Bach.I guess being colored doesn’t make me not likethe same things other folks like who are other races. So will my page be colored that I write? Being me, it will not be white.But it will bea part of you, instructor.You are white—yet a part of me, as I am a part of you.That’s American.Sometimes perhaps you don’t want to be a part of me. Nor do I often want to be a part of you.But we are, that’s true!As I learn from you,I guess you learn from me—although you’re older—and white—and somewhat more free.
This is my page for English B.
_______________________________________________________________ HARLEM (2)Montage for a Dream Deferred, 1951
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore— And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over— like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
___________________________________________________________________________________ GEORGIA DUSK1955
Sometimes there’s a wind in the Georgia duskThat cries and cries and criesIts lonely pity through the Georgia duskVeiling what the darkness hides
Sometimes there’s blood in the Georgia duskLeft by a streak of sunA crimson trickle in the Georgia duskWhose Blood? …Everyone’s
Sometimes a wind in the Georgia duskScatters hate like seedTo sprout its bitter barriersWhere the sunsets bleed
________________________________________________________________________ ABE LINCOLN© 1960 in Voices, May-August issue, p. 17.
Well, I knowYou had a hard time in your life.And I knowYou knew what hard times meant.And I guess you understoodThat most folks ain’t much good,Also soon as good things come,They went.But I think you hopedSome folks sometimes would actSomewhat according to the factThat black or whiteAin’t just whiteOr black ________________________________________________________________________________ doorknobs1961, 1963
The simple silly terrorof a doorknob on a doorthat turns to let in lifeon two feet standing,walking, talking,wearing dress or trousers,maybe drunk or maybe sober,maybe smiling, laughing, happy,maybe tangled in the terrorof a yesterday past grandpawhen the door from out there openedinto here where I, antenna,recipient of your coming,received the talking imageof the simple silly terrorof a door that opensat the turning of a knobto let in lifewalking, talking, standingwearing dress or trousers,drunk or maybe sober,smiling, laughing, happy,or tangled in the terrorof a yesterday past grandpanot of our own doing.
___________________________________________________________________________________I, TOO1925, 1926, 1932, 1959 with revised line 9 (“sit” becomes “be”)
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.They send me to eat in the kitchenWhen company comes,But I laugh,And eat well,And grow strong.
Tomorrow,I’ll be at the tableWhen company comes.Nobody’ll dareSay to me,“Eat in the kitchen,”Then.
Besides,They’ll see how beautiful I amAnd be ashamed—
I, too, am America.
I’ve known rivers:I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset.
I’ve known rivers:Ancient, dusky rivers.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
________________________________________________________________________________________NEGRO1922
I am a Negro:Black as the night is black,Black like the depths of my Africa.
I’ve been a slave:Caesar told me to keep his door-steps clean.I brushed the boots of Washington.
I’ve been a worker:Under my hand the pyramids arose.I made mortar for the Woolworth Building.
I’ve been a singer:All the way from Africa to GeorgiaI carried my sorrow songs.I made ragtime.
I’ve been a victim:The Belgians cut off my hands in the Congo.They lynch me still in Mississippi.
I am a Negro:Black as the night is black,Black like the depths of my Africa.
_________________________________________________________________________________________THE WEARY BLUES1925
Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon, I heard a Negro play.Down on Lenox Avenue the other nightBy the pale dull pallor of an old gas light He did a lazy sway . . . He did a lazy sway . . .To the tune o’ those Weary Blues.With his ebony hands on each ivory keyHe made that poor piano moan with melody. O Blues!Swaying to and fro on his rickety stoolHe played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool. Sweet Blues!Coming from a black man’s soul. O Blues!In a deep song voice with a melancholy toneI heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan— “Ain’t got nobody in all this world, Ain’t got nobody but ma self. I’s gwine to quit ma frownin’ And put ma troubles on the shelf.”
Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.He played a few chords then he sang some more— “I got the Weary Blues And I can’t be satisfied. Got the Weary Blues And can’t be satisfied— I ain’t happy no mo’ And I wish that I had died.”And far into the night he crooned that tune.The stars went out and so did the moon.The singer stopped playing and went to bedWhile the Weary Blues echoed through his head.He slept like a rock or a man that’s dead.
____________________________________________________________________________________________ THE NEGRO MOTHER1931, 1940, 1959
Children, I come back todayTo tell you a story of the long dark wayThat I had to climb, that I had to knowIn order that the race might live and grow.Look at my face - dark as the night -Yet shining like the sun with love's true light.I am the dark girl who crossed the red seaCarrying in my body the seed of the free.I am the woman who worked in the fieldBringing the cotton and the corn to yield.I am the one who labored as a slave,Beaten and mistreated for the work that I gave -Children sold away from me, I'm husband sold, too.No safety, no love, no respect was I due.
Three hundred years in the deepest South:But God put a song and a prayer in my mouth.God put a dream like steel in my soul.Now, through my children, I'm reaching the goal.
Now, through my children, young and free,I realized the blessing deed to me.I couldn't read then. I couldn't write.I had nothing, back there in the night.Sometimes, the valley was filled with tears,But I kept trudging on through the lonely years.Sometimes, the road was hot with the sun,But I had to keep on till my work was done:I had to keep on! No stopping for me -I was the seed of the coming Free.I nourished the dream that nothing could smotherDeep in my breast - the Negro mother.I had only hope then, but now through you,Dark ones of today, my dreams must come true:All you dark children in the world out there,Remember my sweat, my pain, my despair.Remember my years, heavy with sorrow -And make of those years a torch for tomorrow.Make of my path a road to the lightOut of the darkness, the ignorance, the night.Lift high my banner out of the dust.Stand like free men supporting my trust.Believe in the right, let none push you back.Remember the whip and the slaver's track.Remember how the [masters] in struggle and strifeStill bar you the way, and deny you life -But march ever forward, breaking down bars.Look ever upward at the sun and the stars.Oh, my dark children, may my dreams and my prayersImpel you forever up the great stairs -For I will be with you till no white brotherDares keep down the children of the Negro Mother.
_______________________________________________________________________________________ GOOD MORNING REVOLUTION1932
Good morning Revolution: You are the best friend I ever had. We gonna pal around together from now on. Say, listen, Revolution: You know the boss where I used to work, The guy that gimme the air to cut expenses, He wrote a long letter to the papers about you: Said you was a trouble maker, a alien-enemy, In other words a son-of-a-bitch. He called up the police And told’em to watch out for a guy Named Revolution
You see, The boss knows you are my friend. He sees us hanging out together He knows we’re hungry and ragged, And ain’t got a damn thing in this world – And are gonna to do something about it.
The boss got all his needs, certainly, Eats swell, Owns a lotta houses, Goes vacationin’, Breaks strikes, Runs politics, bribes police Pays off congress And struts all over earth –
But me, I ain’t never had enough to eat. Me, I ain’t never been warm in winter. Me, I ain’t never known security – All my life, been livin’ hand to mouth Hand to mouth.
Listen, Revolution, We’re buddies, see – Together, We can take everything: Factories, arsenals, houses, ships, Railroads, forests, fields, orchards, Bus lines, telegraphs, radios, (Jesus! Raise hell with radios!) Steel mills, coal mines, oil wells, gas, All the tools of production. (Great day in the morning!) Everything – And turn’em over to the people who work. Rule and run’em for us people who work.
Boy! Them radios! Broadcasting that very first morning [of the Revolution] to the USSR: Another member of the International Soviet’s done come. Greetings to the Socialist Soviet Republics Hey you rising workers everywhere--Greetings – And we’ll sign it: Germany Sign it: China Sign it: Africa Sign it: Italy Sign it: America Sign it with my one name: Worker On that day when no one will be hungry, cold oppressed, Anywhere in the world again.
That’s our job!
I been starvin’ too long Ain’t you?
Let’s go, Revolution!
____________________________________________________________________________________ LET AMERICA BE AMERICA AGAIN1936
Let America be America again.Let it be the dream it used to be.Let it be the pioneer on the plainSeeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—Let it be that great strong land of loveWhere never kings connive nor tyrants schemeThat any man be crushed by one above.
(It never was America to me.)
O, let my land be a land where LibertyIs crowned with no false patriotic wreath,But opportunity is real, and life is free,Equality is in the air we breathe.
(There’s never been equality for me,Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark? And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.I am the red man driven from the land,I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—And finding only the same old stupid planOf dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
I am the young man, full of strength and hope,Tangled in that ancient endless chainOf profit, power, gain, of grab the land!Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!Of work the men! Of take the pay!Of owning everything for one’s own greed!
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.I am the worker sold to the machine.I am the Negro, servant to you all.I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—Hungry yet today despite the dream.Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!I am the man who never got ahead,The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dreamIn the Old World while still a serf of kings,Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,That even yet its mighty daring singsIn every brick and stone, in every furrow turnedThat’s made America the land it has become.O, I’m the man who sailed those early seasIn search of what I meant to be my home—For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,And torn from Black Africa’s strand I cameTo build a “homeland of the free.”
The free?
Who said the free? Not me?Surely not me? The millions on relief today?The millions shot down when we strike?The millions who have nothing for our pay?For all the dreams we’ve dreamedAnd all the songs we’ve sungAnd all the hopes we’ve heldAnd all the flags we’ve hung,The millions who have nothing for our pay—Except the dream that’s almost dead today.
O, let America be America again—The land that never has been yet—And yet must be—the land where every man is free.The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—Who made America,Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—The steel of freedom does not stain.From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,We must take back our land again,America!
O, yes,I say it plain,America never was America to me,And yet I swear this oath—America will be!
Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,We, the people, must redeemThe land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.The mountains and the endless plain—All, all the stretch of these great green states—And make America again!
______________________________________________________________________________________ FREEDOM TRAINNew Republic version 1947 (revised and expanded in 1959)
I read in the papers about the Freedom TrainI heard on the radio about the Freedom TrainI seen folks talking about the Freedom TrainLord, I've been a-waitin for the Freedom Train!Washington, Richmond, Durham, Chatanooga, AtlantaWay cross Georgia.Lord, Lord, Lordway down in Dixie the only trains I see'sGot a Jim-Crow coaches set aside for me.I hope their ain't no Jim Crow on the Freedom Train,No back door entrance to the Freedom Train,No sign FOR COLORED on the Freedom Train,No WHITE FOLKS ONLY on the Freedom Train.I'm gonna check up.I'm gonna to check up on thisFreedom Train.Who is the engineer on the Freedom Train?Can a coal-black man drive the Freedom Train?Or am I still a porter on the Freedom Train?Is there ballot boxes on the Freedom Train?Do colored folks vote on the Freedom Train?When it stops in Mississippi, will it be made plainEverybody's got a right to board the Freedom Train?I'm gonna check up.I'm gonna to check up on thisFreedom Train.The Birmingham station's marked COLORED and WHITE.The white folks go leftThe colored go right.They even got a segregated lane.Is that the way to get aboard the Freedom Train?I'm gonna check up.I'm gonna to check up on thisFreedom Train.If my children ask me, Daddy, please explainWhy a Jim Crow stations for the Freedom Train?What shall I tell my children?You tell me, cause freedom ain't freedom when a man ain't free.My brother named Jimmy died at AnzioHe died for real, and it wasn't no show.Is this here freedom on the Freedom Train really freedom or a show again?Now let the Freedom Train come zooming down the trackGleaming in the sunlight for white and blackNot stoppin' at no stations marked COLORED nor WHITE,Just stoppin' in the fields in the broad daylight,Stoppin' in the country in the wide-open airWhere there never was a Jim Crow sign nowhere,And No Lilly-White Committees, politicians of note,Nor poll tax layer through which colored can't voteAnd there won't be no kinda color linesThe Freedom Train will be yoursAnd mine.Then maybe from their graves in AnzioBlack men and white will say, We want it so!Black men and white will say, Ain't it fine?At home they got a Freedom train,A Freedom train,That's yours and mine!
_________________________________________________________________________________ THEME FOR ENGLISH B1949, 1951
The instructor said,
Go home and write a page tonight. And let that page come out of you— Then, it will be true.
I wonder if it’s that simple?I am twenty-two, colored, born in Winston-Salem. I went to school there, then Durham, then here to this college on the hill above Harlem. I am the only colored student in my class. The steps from the hill lead down into Harlem, through a park, then I cross St. Nicholas, Eighth Avenue, Seventh, and I come to the Y, the Harlem Branch Y, where I take the elevator up to my room, sit down, and write this page:
It’s not easy to know what is true for you or me at twenty-two, my age. But I guess I’m whatI feel and see and hear, Harlem, I hear you.hear you, hear me—we two—you, me, talk on this page. (I hear New York, too.) Me—who?
Well, I like to eat, sleep, drink, and be in love. I like to work, read, learn, and understand life. I like a pipe for a Christmas present,or records—Bessie, bop, or Bach.I guess being colored doesn’t make me not likethe same things other folks like who are other races. So will my page be colored that I write? Being me, it will not be white.But it will bea part of you, instructor.You are white—yet a part of me, as I am a part of you.That’s American.Sometimes perhaps you don’t want to be a part of me. Nor do I often want to be a part of you.But we are, that’s true!As I learn from you,I guess you learn from me—although you’re older—and white—and somewhat more free.
This is my page for English B.
_______________________________________________________________ HARLEM (2)Montage for a Dream Deferred, 1951
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore— And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over— like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
___________________________________________________________________________________ GEORGIA DUSK1955
Sometimes there’s a wind in the Georgia duskThat cries and cries and criesIts lonely pity through the Georgia duskVeiling what the darkness hides
Sometimes there’s blood in the Georgia duskLeft by a streak of sunA crimson trickle in the Georgia duskWhose Blood? …Everyone’s
Sometimes a wind in the Georgia duskScatters hate like seedTo sprout its bitter barriersWhere the sunsets bleed
________________________________________________________________________ ABE LINCOLN© 1960 in Voices, May-August issue, p. 17.
Well, I knowYou had a hard time in your life.And I knowYou knew what hard times meant.And I guess you understoodThat most folks ain’t much good,Also soon as good things come,They went.But I think you hopedSome folks sometimes would actSomewhat according to the factThat black or whiteAin’t just whiteOr black ________________________________________________________________________________ doorknobs1961, 1963
The simple silly terrorof a doorknob on a doorthat turns to let in lifeon two feet standing,walking, talking,wearing dress or trousers,maybe drunk or maybe sober,maybe smiling, laughing, happy,maybe tangled in the terrorof a yesterday past grandpawhen the door from out there openedinto here where I, antenna,recipient of your coming,received the talking imageof the simple silly terrorof a door that opensat the turning of a knobto let in lifewalking, talking, standingwearing dress or trousers,drunk or maybe sober,smiling, laughing, happy,or tangled in the terrorof a yesterday past grandpanot of our own doing.
___________________________________________________________________________________I, TOO1925, 1926, 1932, 1959 with revised line 9 (“sit” becomes “be”)
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.They send me to eat in the kitchenWhen company comes,But I laugh,And eat well,And grow strong.
Tomorrow,I’ll be at the tableWhen company comes.Nobody’ll dareSay to me,“Eat in the kitchen,”Then.
Besides,They’ll see how beautiful I amAnd be ashamed—
I, too, am America.
Hansberry, Langston Hughes, and the Harlem Renaissance
Although Lorraine Hansberry wrote A Raisin in the Sun at the end of the 1950s, in a significant sense her landmark play extends the legacy of the Harlem Renaissance. The Harlem Renaissance refers to a major explosion of Black intellectual and artistic activity that erupted in the 1920s. Though centered on the Harlem neighborhood of New York City, the Renaissance had an international reach that witnessed the flowering of Black intellectual discourse, literature, visual art, music, and fashion. All of these forms of cultural and artistic production sought to challenge racism, subvert predominant stereotypes, and develop progressive new politics to advance Black people and promote integration.
At the very center of the Harlem Renaissance stood the figure known as the New Negro. The “Old Negro” remained hampered by the historical trauma of slavery. The “New Negro,” by contrast, possessed a renewed sense of self, purpose, and pride, all guided by a unifying vision of Pan-African identity. Alain Locke announced the arrival of the New Negro in his landmark 1925 anthology The New Negro, which featured fiction, poetry, and essays by important writers such as Countee Cullen, Zora Neale Hurston, Claude McKay, and Jean Toomer.
Hansberry makes her connection to the Harlem Renaissance most obvious through the title of her play. The phrase “a raisin in the sun” comes from the poem “Harlem” by the preeminent poet, Langston Hughes. Hughes’s poem opens with a question: “What happens to a dream deferred?” The “dream” referenced in this question is the dream of the New Negro—that is, the dream of a better life for people of African descent as well as the flourishing of Black arts both in the United States and abroad.
In the rest of the poem, Hughes offers a series of possible answers to his question, the first of which gives Hansberry her title: “Does it dry up / like a raisin in the sun?” All of the proposed answers have negative connotations, as expressed in the poet’s choice of verbs like “fester,” “stink,” “crust,” and “sag,” and the poem ends with the suggestion of a violent outbreak: “Or does it explode?” Although in “Harlem” Hughes implies the possibility of ongoing Black oppression, elsewhere he expresses hope for the future. For instance, in his poem “Youth” he indicates his faith that the next generation of African Americans will achieve freedom.
More than thirty years after the Harlem Renaissance, Hansberry would pose Hughes’s question once again. In re-posing the question (“What happens to a dream deferred?”), Hansberry recognizes that the dream of equality to which Hughes referred, and toward which the artists and intellectuals of the Harlem Renaissance worked, still had not arrived. All of Hansberry’s characters in A Raisin in the Sun could be considered struggling versions of the Harlem Renaissance’s New Negro. Indeed, they all share the same dreams that had given life to the idea of the New Negro. That is, they seek to realize their full potential through education (e.g., Beneatha), more fulfilling work (e.g., Walter), and higher standards of living (e.g., Mama, Ruth).
Yet in Hansberry’s play the ideal of the New Negro comes up against numerous pitfalls and roadblocks, suggesting that the racism against which so many artists and intellectuals had fought during the Harlem Renaissance remained alive and well. Hansberry signals the necessity of a break, maybe even a violent one, not unlike what Hughes invokes when he asks if a dream that continuously gets put off will eventually explode. © The Editors of SPARKNOTES
At the very center of the Harlem Renaissance stood the figure known as the New Negro. The “Old Negro” remained hampered by the historical trauma of slavery. The “New Negro,” by contrast, possessed a renewed sense of self, purpose, and pride, all guided by a unifying vision of Pan-African identity. Alain Locke announced the arrival of the New Negro in his landmark 1925 anthology The New Negro, which featured fiction, poetry, and essays by important writers such as Countee Cullen, Zora Neale Hurston, Claude McKay, and Jean Toomer.
Hansberry makes her connection to the Harlem Renaissance most obvious through the title of her play. The phrase “a raisin in the sun” comes from the poem “Harlem” by the preeminent poet, Langston Hughes. Hughes’s poem opens with a question: “What happens to a dream deferred?” The “dream” referenced in this question is the dream of the New Negro—that is, the dream of a better life for people of African descent as well as the flourishing of Black arts both in the United States and abroad.
In the rest of the poem, Hughes offers a series of possible answers to his question, the first of which gives Hansberry her title: “Does it dry up / like a raisin in the sun?” All of the proposed answers have negative connotations, as expressed in the poet’s choice of verbs like “fester,” “stink,” “crust,” and “sag,” and the poem ends with the suggestion of a violent outbreak: “Or does it explode?” Although in “Harlem” Hughes implies the possibility of ongoing Black oppression, elsewhere he expresses hope for the future. For instance, in his poem “Youth” he indicates his faith that the next generation of African Americans will achieve freedom.
More than thirty years after the Harlem Renaissance, Hansberry would pose Hughes’s question once again. In re-posing the question (“What happens to a dream deferred?”), Hansberry recognizes that the dream of equality to which Hughes referred, and toward which the artists and intellectuals of the Harlem Renaissance worked, still had not arrived. All of Hansberry’s characters in A Raisin in the Sun could be considered struggling versions of the Harlem Renaissance’s New Negro. Indeed, they all share the same dreams that had given life to the idea of the New Negro. That is, they seek to realize their full potential through education (e.g., Beneatha), more fulfilling work (e.g., Walter), and higher standards of living (e.g., Mama, Ruth).
Yet in Hansberry’s play the ideal of the New Negro comes up against numerous pitfalls and roadblocks, suggesting that the racism against which so many artists and intellectuals had fought during the Harlem Renaissance remained alive and well. Hansberry signals the necessity of a break, maybe even a violent one, not unlike what Hughes invokes when he asks if a dream that continuously gets put off will eventually explode. © The Editors of SPARKNOTES
© All poems found in THE COLLECTED POEMS OF LANGSTON HUGHES, edited by Arnold Rampersad and David Roessel. Vintage Classics (Random House). 1994.© 1994 by The Estate of Langston Hughes.
THE NEGRO SPEAKS OF RIVERS (1921): https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/negro-speaks-rivers
NEGRO (1922) with competent analysis: https://honorslitfinal.weebly.com/analysis.html
I, TOO (1925; line 9 revised from “sit” to “be” in 1959): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47558/i-too
THE WEARY BLUES (1925): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47347/the-weary-blues
THE NEGRO MOTHER (1931): https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-negro-mother/
GOOD MORNING REVOLUTION (1932): https://theworkersdreadnought.wordpress.com/2008/12/13/good-morning-revolution-langston-hughes-1932/
LET AMERICA BE AMERICA AGAIN (1936): https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/let-america-be-america-again
FREEDOM TRAIN (Original 1947 version): http://org.coloradomesa.edu/~blaga/421/Freedom_Train.html
THEME FOR ENGLISH B (1949, 1951): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47880/theme-for-english-b
HARLEM [2] (1951): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46548/harlem
doorknobs: https://lyrics.az/langston-hughes/-/doorknobs.html