Maya Angelou Dies at 86

Photo: Dwight Carter; from USAToday.com post

Maya Angelou was more than a poet. She was a professor, a dancer, a cook, an actress, a civil rights activist, a mother--the list goes on and on. While I will admit to never having read much of her actual published work, I have found her to be an inspiration based on her life and actions alone. Often quoted, her thoughts on love and life and being true to oneself always spoke to a deep part of my soul.

CNN reports on her death (with a lovely tribute video, as well), though the cause has not yet been reported. A press conference will be held at 11:45 a.m. EST, according to Fox News.

(CNN) -- Maya Angelou, a renowned poet, novelist and actress, has died at age 86, her literary agent, Helen Brann, said Wednesday. 

She died at her home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Brann said. 

Also a professor, singer and dancer, Angelou's work spans several professions. In 2011, President Barack Obama awarded her with the Medal of Freedom, the country's highest civilian honor. 

One of Angelou's most revered books was "I Know Why the Caged Sings."
Writer Julian Mayfield is said to have described the autobiography as "a work of art which eludes description." 

Angelou spent her early years studying dance and drama in San Francisco but dropped out at age 14, instead becoming the city's first African-American female cable car conductor.
Angelou later returned to high school to finish her diploma and gave birth a few weeks after graduation. While the 17-year-old single mother waited tables to support her son, she acquired a passion for music and dance, and toured Europe in the mid-1950s in the opera production "Porgy and Bess." In 1957, she recorded her first album, "Calypso Lady." 

In 1958, Angelou become a part of the Harlem Writers Guild in New York and also played a queen in "The Blacks," an off-Broadway production by French dramatist Jean Genet. 

Affectionately referred to as Dr. Angelou, the professor never went to college. She has more than 30 honorary degrees and taught American studies for years at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem. 

"I created myself," she has said. "I have taught myself so much." 

Angelou was born April 4, 1928, in St. Louis. She grew up between St. Louis and the then-racially segregated town of Stamps, Arkansas. 

The famous poet got into writing after a childhood tragedy that stunned her into silence for years. When she was 7, her mother's boyfriend raped her. He was later beaten to death by a mob after she testified against him. 

"My 7-and-a-half-year-old logic deduced that my voice had killed him, so I stopped speaking for almost six years," she said. 

From the silence, a louder voice was born. 

Her list of friends is as impressive as her illustrious career. Talk show queen Oprah Winfrey referred to her as "sister friend." She counted Martin Luther King Jr., with whom she worked during the civil rights movement, among her friends. King was assassinated on her birthday. 

Angelou spoke at least six languages and worked at one time as a newspaper editor in Egypt and Ghana. It was during that time that she wrote "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings," which launched the first in a series of autobiographical books. 

"I want to write so well that a person is 30 or 40 pages in a book of mine ... before she realizes she's reading," Angelou said. 

She was also one of the first black women film directors. Her work on Broadway has been nominated for Tony Awards. 

Before making it big, the 6-foot-tall wordsmith also worked as a cook and sang with a traveling road show. 

"Look where we've all come from ... coming out of darkness, moving toward the light," she once said. "It is a long journey, but a sweet one, bittersweet." 

See the original post HERE 

While you will be missed, Maya, you will certainly live on in your words and in the inspiration you've provided for so many. Rest in peace.

Poetry Tuesday!

April is National Poetry Month...who knew? I certainly didn't.

But now that I do, this Poem-a-Day Challenge (with prompts!) launched by the Writer's Digest poetry blogger sounds pretty fun:

Happy National Poetry Month! Over at Writers Digest, Poetry Asides blogger Robert Lee Brewer launched the Poem-a-Day Challenge. At the same time, poets around the country have joined the annual National Poetry Writing Month.

The challenge is simple: write a poem every day in April. The challenge kicked off [on Sunday, April 1] and will run until May 1st to accommodate international participants. Follow this link for all the details.

Here’s more about the challenge: “If you want to share your poems throughout the month, the best way is to paste your poem in the comments on the post that corresponds with that day’s prompt. You’ll find folks are pretty supportive on the Poetic Asides site. And if they’re not, I expect to be notified via e-mail.” Will you participate? (via Debbie Ohi)

See the post on GalleyCat HERE

Now, though this has nothing to do with a poetry prompt of any kind and is not something I created recently at all, I figured I'd share with you a silly poem I wrote in a creative writing class many, many years ago:

"Jimmy"

Mad man Jimmy
Sure did know how to shimmy
Out on the old dance floor.
His knees they creaked,
His shoes, oh the squeak!
In the center of the grocery store.

With a tap of his foot
A black scuff mark he put
On his way down the shampoo aisle.
He boogied along
To a Neil Diamond song
And boy, did he have style!

“Hey, Jimmy old friend
Watch out for that blend!”
Called Cashier Joe with a start.
Jimmy slipped on his lace,
Coffee cans smashed in his face,
His body flung into a cart.

Now, he leapt to his feet
And stepped back to the beat
In a coffee-ground covered jive.
“Sorry, Joe,” Jimmy said
With a nod of his head,
“Clean up on Aisle five.”

The Browning Collection Goes Digital

While I am not partaking in today's "festivities" for various reasons, I will post one love-related thing I heard on NPR this morning because it's pretty damn cool.

Wellesley College is finally sharing the wealth and letting us all see the handwritten love letters between Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barret Browning without having to go to their campus to do so. The school working in collaboration with Baylor University to digitize the letters so they can now be viewed online, according to theLedger.com:

“I love your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett ...”

So begins the first love letter to 19th century poet Elizabeth Barrett from her future husband, fellow poet Robert Browning.

Their 573 love letters, which capture their courtship, their blossoming love and their forbidden marriage, have long fascinated scholars and poetry fans. Though transcriptions of their correspondence have been published in the past, the handwritten letters could only be seen at Wellesley College, where the collection has been kept since 1930.

But starting today, Valentine’s Day, their famous love letters will become available online where readers can see them — just as they were written — with creased paper, fading ink, quill pen cross outs, and even the envelopes the two poets used.

The digitization project is a collaboration between Wellesley and Baylor University in Waco, Texas, which houses the world’s largest collection of books, letters and other items related to the Brownings.

Wellesley administrators hope the project will expose students, romantics, poetry fans and others to their love story.

Barrett, one of the most well-known poets of the Victorian era, suffered from chronic illness and was in her late 30s when Browning first wrote her in 1845 to tell her he admired her work.

In their fifth month of corresponding, they met for the first time, introduced by Barrett’s cousin.

After more than a year of almost daily letters between them, the couple married in secret in September 1846, defying her father’s prohibition against her ever marrying. They fled from London to Italy, where doctors had told Barrett her health might improve. Her father disinherited her and never spoke to her again.

“It’s the fact that she defied her father, she was in ill health, they fell in love through letters, she left with hardly anything,” said Ruth Rogers, Wellesley’s curator of special collections.

“If you want a perfect romance, just read the letters,” she said.

The website set up for readers to see the correspondence includes both the handwritten letters and transcriptions, as well as a zoom function for readers to try to decipher faded or illegible words. The body of letters will also be searchable by keywords.

Readers can see for themselves how they fall in love, while corresponding about other writers, philosophy and their own work. Barrett first wrote the lines of what would become her most famous poem after she met Browning, “How Do I Love Thee? Let me count the ways.”

The website is: http://www.wellesley.edu/browning

Read the original post HERE

Book Review: The Anthologist

Publishers Weekly gave Nicholson Baker's The Anthologist a starred review, saying "Baker pulls off an original and touching story, demonstrating his remarkable writing ability while putting it under a microscope."

Linnea over at Art Ravels posted a equally glowing review, giving a little more insight into the newest of Baker's novels:

I can't remember the last time I wrote about a novel, but then again I can't remember that last time I picked up such a good novel. The Anthologist by Nicholson Baker is a simple story told in a great voice that is incredibly appealing.

Told from the point of view of Paul Chowder, a sometime poet writing an introduction to an anthology of rhyming poetry, the story unfolds into one of intimate, blind self-destruction....

Read the rest of Linnea's review HERE