MAYA ANGELOU

Angelou (1928- ) was born Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, MO, and sent by her divorcing parents to Stamps, Arkansas, to live with a grandmother. After a tortured youth of drugs, prostitution, rape, and bearing a child out of wedlock, Angelou sought freedom and independence, and obtained a job as an entertainer. She toured Europe and Africa, and it was at this time that she adopted her current name. She moved to Africa in 1961 and lived and taught in Ghana. Upon her return to the U.S., she wrote and performed in plays, and it was her 1977 performance in Roots that earned her an Emmy nomination. She has written a lengthy autobiography and several volumes of poetry, and since 1981 has held an endowed chair as Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University. Angelou delivered the Inauguration poem for the installation of President Bill Clinton in 1993.

GWENDOLYN BROOKS

Brooks (1917- ) was born in Topeka, Kansas, grew up in Chicago, and experienced a happy and secure childhood. She started writing poetry at age 7, and at age 16 was encouraged to continue by Langston Hughes. She won her first award in 1943 and published her first book of poetry two years later. In 1950, Brooks became the first African American to be awarded the Pulitzer prize, this for her work in Annie Allen (1949). Her study of her native black world began with In the Mecca (1968), and she stated that she would no longer make her work available through "white publishers."

MARGARET DANNER

Danner (1915- ) was born in Kentucky and first attracted critical attention in 1945 when she came in second place at a poetry convention at Northwestern University. In 1956 she was named assistant editor of Poetry: The Magazine in Verse, the first black to hold that position. In 1961 Danner became poet-in-residence at Wayne State University in Detroit. She had published her first collection of poetry in 1960, and six years later was able to visit Africa, where she read her poetry. Her poetry makes use of African images and symbols. She later found it difficult to write poetry because of oncoming blindness.