The Poetry of James Weldon...
James Weldon Johnson
James Weldon Johnson was born in Jacksonville, Florida on June 17th 1871. His mother, Helen, a musician and a public school teacher initially home-schooled him giving him a love of both English literature and European music.
At 16 his education moved to Atlanta University and he graduated with a degree in 1894.
In 1904 Johnson helped in Theodore Roosevelt's presidential bid. On winning Roosevelt appointed him as US consul at Puerto Cabello, Venezuela in 1906 and then Nicaragua from 1909.
Johnson worked for the NAACP from 1916 as a field secretary, organizing local chapters. To counter race riots and lynching’s he organized mass demonstrations, such as a silent protest parade of over ten thousand African Americans down New York’s Fifth Avenue in July 1917.
In 1920 Johnson was elected to manage the NAACP, the first African American to hold this position. That same year he was dispatched to monitor conditions in Haiti and described in The Nation the brutal occupation and also offered remedies. During the 1920’s he was one of the major inspirations of the Harlem Renaissance
In the midst of all this he continued to write novels, poems, and folklore. In 1917, he saw published ‘50 Years and Other Poems’. In 1922, he edited ‘The Book of American Negro Poetry’, which the Academy of American Poets calls "a major contribution to the history of African-American literature." In 1927 followed ‘God's Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse’.
One of the first African-American professors at NYU he was also, later, a professor of creative literature and writing at Fisk University. His career spanned several elements; education, the diplomatic corps, civil rights activism, literature, poetry, and music.
James Weldon Johnson died on June 26th, 1938 whilst vacationing in Wiscasset, Maine when his car was hit by a train.
01 - The Poetry of James Weldon Johnson
02 - Mother Night by James Weldon Johnson
03 - Brothers. American Drama by James Weldon Johnson
04 - A Poet to His Baby Son by James Weldon Johnson
05 - O Black and Unknown Bards by James Weldon Johnson
06 - Lift Every Voice and Sing by James Weldon Johnson
07 - I Hear the Stars Still Singing by James Weldon Johnson
08 - A Mid-Day Dreamer by James Weldon Johnson
09 - Morning, Noon and Night by James Weldon Johnson
10 - The Temptress by James Weldon Johnson
11 - Venus in the Garden by James Weldon Johnson
12 - The White Witch by James Weldon Johnson
13 - Beauty That Is Never Old by James Weldon Johnson
14 - Before A Painting by James Weldon Johnson
15 - The Awakening by James Weldon Johnson
16 - The Glory of the Day Was in Her Face by James Weldon Johnson
17 - Her Eyes, Twin Pools by James Weldon Johnson
18 - Down By The Carib Sea by James Weldon Johnson
19 - Deep in the Quiet Wood by James Weldon Johnson
20 - O Southland by James Weldon Johnson
21 - Fifty Years (1863 - 1913) by James Weldon Johnson
22 - The Suicide by James Weldon Johnson
23 - And the Greatest of These Is War by James Weldon Johnson
25 - Sonnet by James Weldon Johnson
26 - To America by James Weldon Johnson
27 - Life by James Weldon Johnson
28 - Ghosts of the Old Year by James Weldon Johnson
29 - Lazy by James Weldon Johnson
30 - The Word of an Engineer by James Weldon Johnson
31 - The Creation by James Weldon Johnson
32 - Prayer At Sunrise by James Weldon Johnson
33 - Listen Lord, A Prayer by James Weldon Johnson
34 - The Reward by James Weldon Johnson
35 - Sleep by James Weldon Johnson
36 - Go Down Death by James Weldon Johnson
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