In 1970, a child with skinny legs and muddy skin was introduced into African American literature. Born marguerite Johnson she became known as Maya Angelou (Lupton 51). Her critically acclaimed works have changed the way of the African American autobiography is written.
All in all, Maya Angelou's poems have became more inspirational as there years went on and the African Americans got the rights they deserved. She used imagery and a lot of emotions through her poems, as if you could feel the pain they had went through. Her poems had plenty of hope in them. She was hoping for the best during the Civil Rights Movement. In I Know Why The Cage Birds Sing, you can feel how that poem changed from the negative times to the positive. She talked about how the American Dream of giving blacks rights before the movement they had no hope, but as the poem went on you can feel a more positive vibe of hope.
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel” (Maya Angelou “Quotes”). Maya Angelou is an African American author who wanted the whole world to know who she was. Even though Maya Angelou’s life was full of disappointments and miseries, she still managed to rise above them all to become a successful poet. Racism played a really big role in Maya Angelou’s life. Maya Angelou witnessed slavery when she was very young and wished that someday all men will be free. Maya Angelou had many difficulties, and her family was one of them. None of her marriages worked out, and had a son to raise on her own.
Angelou faced many obstacles but still was able to accomplish many things. Did she ever think she was going to get this far, leaving an impact on many people lives, such as Oprah Winfrey, President Obama, former president Bill Clinton and overall the general public? Perhaps, she did know. In her 20’s the public icon, met Billie Holiday, who told her, “You’re going to be famous. But it won’t be for singing.” Angelou is a three time Grammy winner who was also nominated for a Tony, a Pulitzer, and an Emmy for her role in the 1977 miniseries “roots.”
Dr. Maya Angelou was born on April 4, 1928 in St. Louis Missouri. Angelou was raised in St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas. In Stamps she was faced with the brutality of racial discrimination, and a very traumatic incident where she, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend when she was eight, but because of this she also developed an unshakable faith and values of traditional African-American family. (Angelou)This shaped her poetry and her involvement in the arts. Where she began to sing and dance and planned to audition in professional theater but that didn’t work out well because she began working as a nightclub waitress, tangled with drugs and prostitution and danced in a strip club. In 1959, she moved to New York, became friends with prominent Harlem writers, and got involved with the civil rights movement. In 1961, she moved to Egypt with a boyfriend and edited for the Arab Observer. When she returned to the U.S., she began publishing her multivolume autobiography, starting with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings as well as several books of poetry and the third being Still I Rise in published in 1978. (Maya Angelou is born) Because of this life of hardship shaped her to who she is and was the inspiration for a lot of her poetry.
Marguerite Anne Johnson, better known as Maya Angelou, was born on April 4, 1928 in St. Louis, Missouri. She was born and raised in an era that involved the Great Depression and World War I. When her parents divorced at a young age, she and her brother were sent to live with her grandmother in a heavily racially segregated Stamps , Arkansas. She found solace in her brother, Bailey, in the hard times produced by the South. This segregation was severe in this era, especially for shy young Marguerite. Throughout her childhood, she was sent from her grandmother to her father and mother. All these different environments exposed Angelou to a series of experiences including: racism, segregation, music, and politics. These experiences were most likely what prompted her to chronicle her life through autobiographical works as well as poems. In these works, Angelou utilizes elements such as literary devices, poetic devices, allusions, recurring themes and symbols to portray
Maya Angelou was one of America’s greatest writers in history. She was known for her many writings and for her part in Civil Rights Movements. Maya Angelou went through many hardships during her childhood, the most prevalent of those, racism over her skin color. This racism affected where she grew up, where she went to school, even where she got a job. “My education and that of my Black associates were quite different from the education of our white schoolmates. In the classroom we all learned past participles, but in the streets and in our homes the Blacks learned to drops s’s from plurals and suffixes from past tense verbs.” (Angelou 221) Maya Angelou was a strong believer in a good education and many of those beliefs were described in her
The roller-coaster life of Maya Angelou has included many ups and downs that have become the stuff out of which she has written a six volume autobiography, beginning with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and ending recently with the last installment, A Song Flung up to Heaven. Angelou was born Marguerite Johnson on April 4, 1928, in St. Louis, Missouri (Weaver G-10). Angelou's life has been filled with chaos and despair as well as success and love. She was raped by her mother's boyfriend at the age of 8 and at various times in her life she toiled in a variety of occupations including Creole cook, calypso dancer, actress, madam, civil-righ...
Ms. Angelou left her birth place as a young child after her parents had broken up. Ms. Angelou and her brother were sent to live with her fathers’ Mother in Stamps, Arkansas. Some may call Ms. Angelou’s 1969 autobiography ”I Know Why the Caged Bird Sing” her claim to fame, some may call her poetry her occupation, and more over there are still some that would like to call her Freelance writings Maya Angelou’s life’s work. Ms. Angelou was so much more. Ms. Angelou has been known for being a Civil Rights activist, a poet, a philosopher, a teacher, an Award-winning Author, an actress, a screenwriter and the
In conclusion, Maya Angelou’s poems are still very applicable to the lives of her reader’s today. To
Maya Angelou is one of most well-known poets ever. Her work is a reflection of her hardships during her childhood and her life as an adult. She expressed many of her opinions through her poetry and other writing. Many of her poems revolve around equality and freedom because she grew up in the segregated era and worked with civil right activist. The poems she writes are to inspire the lives of others. Till this day, Maya Angelou is still continuing to write inspiring poetry.
She also published several collections of poetry, including Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'Fore I Die (1971), which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. One of Angelou's most famous works is the poem "On the Pulse of Morning," which she wrote especially for and recited at President Bill Clinton's inaugural ceremony in January 1993 marking the first inaugural recitation since 1961, when Robert Frost delivered his poem "The Gift Outright" at President John F. Kennedy's inauguration. Angelou went on to win a Grammy Award (best spoken word album) for the audio version of the poem. In 1995, Angelou was lauded for remaining on The New York Times' paperback nonfiction best-seller list for two years the longest-running record in the chart's history. Seeking new creative challenges, Angelou made her directorial debut in 1998 with Down in the Delta, starring Alfre Woodard. She also wrote a number of inspirational works, from the essay collection Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now (1994) to her advice for young women in Letter to My Daughter (2008). Interested in health, Angelou has even published cookbooks, including Hallelujah! The Welcome Table: A Lifetime of Memories With Recipes (2005) and Great Food, All Day Long (2010). Angelou's career has seen numerous accolades, including the Chicago International Film Festival's 1998 Audience Choice Award and a nod from the Acapulco Black Film Festival in 1999 for Down in the Delta; and two NAACP Image Awards in the outstanding literary work (nonfiction) category, for her 2005 cookbook and 2008's Letter to My Daughter. Martin Luther King Jr., a close friend of Angelou's, was assassinated on her birthday (April 4) in 1968. Angelou stopped celebrating her
"Angelou, Maya (née Marguerite Annie Johnson)." Encyclopedia of African-american Writing. Amenia: Grey House Publishing, 2009. Credo Reference. Web. 12 March 2014.
As stated in Agnes De Mille (1905 ~ 1993), To this day, the remarkable impact she’s made not just on American dance, but in the world of dance are distinctive achievements worthy of constant recognition and a place in major dance and theater history” (Agnes De Mille (1905 ~ 1993), (n.d.). Even after Agnes de Mille death, she wasn’t forgotten: “At the time of her death in October, 1993 at the age of 88, was still an influential and productive leader in the cultural life of our country” (Agnes DeMille Dances – Biography,