Vise Library celebrates Black History Month: Writers and Poets

Today's feature is on African American Writers and Poets

Alice Walker
Alice won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction for her novel The Color Purple in 1983.  Her writing deals with social and political change.  In addition to being a writer, Alice has taught African American women studies at Yale, Berkeley, UMASS and Wellesley.  She is a big supporter of women's rights and often travel to lend her voice in support of important issues.

• Alice Walker in the Vise Library: Checkout the book Hard Times Require Furious Dancing located at 811.54 W177 Har

Nikki Giovanni
Giovanni is a very well known poet and has received numerous awards for her writing.  A lot of her earlier writing deals with civil rights and political issues.  Along with her writing, she is a college professor.  She has taught at Rutgers, VA Tech, and has been a traveling professor for Fisk University in Nashville. She also visited Cumberland University in Fall 2007 for a poetry reading.

• Nikki Giovanni in the Vise Library:  Checkout the book Bicycles: Love Poems located at 811.54 Gio

Richard Wright
Richard Wright was a writer who's work race relations.  After his book Native Son was published, he was the most respected and wealthiest black writer in America.  The Book of the Month Club selected this book as their first book by an African American Author.

• Richard Wright in the Vise Library:  Checkout the book Black Boy located at 813.52 W952b

Sources Consulted:

http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-998

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/nikki-giovanni

http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/s_z/r_wright/wright_life.htm