The multi-talented female figure of the Civil Rights era “Maya Angelou”

Among figures of outstanding talents throughout the United States are Black people, who have learnt to stand out and put their mark on the US history. One them is Maya Angelou, the African-American woman with many-facetted career that ranged from author, playwright, poet, dancer, actress and singer to civil rights activist and politician.

Biography of Maya Angelou

The famous American poet, activist and autobiographical Maya Angelou was born Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri on April 4, 1928 and died on May 28, 2014, at the age of 86, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina where she served as Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University. Before dedicating her life to writing and the education field, she had already worked as a singer, dancer, actress, and even became Hollywood’s first female black director. As she was more acclaimed for her writing skills, she started first a carrier as a poet and then continued as an autobiographer that increasingly propelled her to be mostly noticed and highly appreciated. One of her autobiographical book that made it an immediate bestseller shortly after it was published is entitled “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” and was also nominated for the National Book Award. Across her autobiography she partly depicts her early years in Long Beach, St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas when she dealt with great hardships all along her childhood such as the time when she had been raped at 7, her early pregnancy when she was just 17 and the death of her mother. Those hard trials she had to undergo had actually matured her from a shy and vulnerable girl into a self-confident and strong woman that still continues to inspire numerous worldwide lives, more particularly those of her female counterparts.

As far as her career as a civil rights activist is concerned, she became acquainted with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. after she heard about Dr King’s message that led her to take part into the struggle for civil rights. As a result, she had been appointed as Southerner Christian Leadership Conference’s northern coordinator in 1960 and was then assigned to organize a march in 1968. She had also befriended Malcolm X when she was living in Ghana and helped him build the newly formed Organization of African American Unity. Unfortunately, both Dr King and Malcolm X were assassinated. Devastated again, Maya Angelou had however overcome her grief - as she always did since then - when she met James Baldwin, the one who mostly encouraged her to write it all down and to hone her writing skills. Thanks to her many achievements, Angelou had been awarded over 50 honorary degrees before her death. She was also awarded the National Medal Arts by President Bill Clinton in 2000, the Lincoln Medal in 2008, the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama (2011), the Literarian Award from the National Book Foundation (2013), and the Mailer Prize for Lifetime Achievement in 2013. Here is one of her poetry work entitled “Still I Rise” published in 1978:

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But, like dust, I’ll rise.

Sources : Thought Co / Poets.org