Writer. Activist. Poet. Storyteller. Troubador.
Dr. Maya Angelou?passed away at the age of 86?today in Winston-Salem, NC. She is famous for her writings of poetry and her autobiographical pieces on growing up under the Jim Crow laws, and was honored with over fifty awards for her writings, most notably her work?I Know Why The Caged Bird?Sings.?The most notable acclaim that she has received was the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
She was also to be honored with the Beacon of Life Award from the MLB Beacon Award Luncheon, but had to cancel her appearance due to health problems.
Her Beginnings.
Born on?April 4, 1928?in St. Louis, Missouri, as Marguerite Ann Johnson, Dr. Angelou was raised in St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas.
During her childhood in Stamps, Dr. Angelou experienced the harsh brutality of discrimination due to her race. However, in spite of the brutality of her childhood, she also absorbed an unshakable faith and values that are tied to traditional African American family, community, and culture.
Dr. Angelou had a passionate love for the arts and this passion won her a scholarship to study dance and drama at San Francisco’s Labor School. But, at fourteen years old, she dropped out to become America’s first African American female cable car conductor.
She did finish high school later on and gave birth to her son, Guy, a few weeks after graduating high school.
Because she was a young, single mother, she supported herself and her son by working as a cook and a waitress, but her passion for the arts would soon take center stage once again.
Survivor.
At the age of eight years old, Dr. Angelou was sexually abused and and raped by her mother’s boyfriend. She told her brother, who told the rest of the family. The man was found guilty but only jailed for one day- four days later, he was murdered.
Due to the murder, Dr. Angelou became mute for five years, believing that, because she named him as her rapist, she killed him.
Her Passions Take The Lead.
In the fifties, she traveled with different artists, dancing, in Europe and around the world. She was also an?exotic dancer?in San Francisco for a time after her marriage to a Greek electrician ended in 1954- she was determined to do anything that she could to support herself and her son.
In 1958, she joined the Harlem Writer’s Guild and performed in various theater productions, even writing in one.
In 1960, she moved to Cairo, Egypt and served as an editor on an English newspaper there.
In 1961, she moved to Ghana, and taught there at the university for a time, wrote for?The Ghanan Times, and was a feature editor?The African Review.?
She was active in the Civil Rights’ Movement, working with both Dr. Martin Luther King and Malcolm X.
The Caged Bird.?
After her extensive traveling in Africa, Dr. Angelou returned to the US to help Malcolm X found the Organization of Afro-American Unity- he was assassinated shortly afterwards.
Devastated by his death, she went to stay with her brother in Hawaii, resuming her singing career, and then returned to LA to focus on her writing.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, asked her to organize a march and she agreed- however, she had to postpone and he was assassinated on her 40th birthday in Memphis, TN.
1968 was a year of great loss for the nation as a whole and for Dr. Angelou personally, but this was the time that she began to write in earnest and discovered the depth of her creative spirit.
This is when she learned why the caged bird sings.
Later Life.
Later in life, Dr. Angelou continued to work towards good for all and continued to write.
Books of poetry, more autobiographical pieces, reciting one of her poems at President Clinton’s 1993 presidential inauguration- Dr. Angelou lived a full life.
While she is no longer with us in body, she will continue to live on in her works and in her writings.
Thank you, Dr. Angelou, for all you have given us and may you rest in peace.
Edited/Published by: SB
