Ishmael Reed

The author of 28 published books to date, Ishmael Reed is a novelist, poet, playwright, and essayist.  He is also a publisher, editor of 13 anthologies and numerous magazines, a television producer, public media commentator, teacher, and lecturer. At a September 11, 2011, concert at the Grande Halle de la Villette in Paris, France, Macy Gray, Tony Allen, members of the Roots, David Murray and his Big Band, Amp Fiddler and Fela! singer/dancers premiered three songs with lyrics by Ishmael Reed

Juice!, Reed’s tenth novel, was published by Dalkey Archive Press in 2011 and includes more than 20 of his original cartoons, including the cover art. In 2010, Reed’s most recent essay collection, Barack Obama and the Jim Crow Media: The Return of the Nigger Breakers, was published by Canada’s Baraka Press.  His 2009 publications include Ishmael Reed, The Plays,a collection of his six plays (Dalkey), and POW WOW: Charting the Fault Lines in the American Experience—Short Fiction from Then to Now (Da Capo Press), an anthology edited by Reed with Carla Blank. Forthcoming books are: The Fighter and the Writer: Two American Stories, a nonfiction work from Random House, and Going Too Far, a new book of essays.

Founder of the Before Columbus Foundation and PEN Oakland, Reed taught at the University of California, Berkeley, for more than 30 years, retiring in 2005.  A  MacArthur Fellow, his honors include nominations for a National Book Award and a Pulitzer Prize, a Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Writers’ Award, the 2008 Blues Songwriter of the Year from the West Coast Blues Hall of Fame, and San Francisco Litquake’s 2011 Barbary Coast Award. 

A 1972 manifesto inspired a major visual art exhibit and book NeoHooDoo: Art for a Forgotten Faith, curated by Franklin Sirmans for The Menil Collection in Houston, where it opened June 27, 2008, and ran through 2009. The exhibit subsequently traveled to New York’s P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center and the Miami Art Museum. A poem written in Seattle in 1969, “Beware Do Not Read This Poem,” has been cited by Gale Research Company as one of the approximately 20 poems that teachers and librarians identified as the most frequently studied in literature courses.

His online literary magazine, Konch, can be found at www.ishmaelreedpub.com.  His San Francisco Chronicle blog is located at www.sfgate.com. Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and raised in Buffalo, New York, Reed now lives in Oakland, California. His archives are maintained at the University of Delaware in Newark, Delaware.

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o is currently distinguished professor of English and comparative literature at the University of California, Irvine. He is a recipient of eight honorary doctorates, is a fellow of the Modern Language Association, and an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Ngũgĩ, formerly Erich Maria Remarque Professor of Languages and professor of comparative literature and performance studies, New York University, is a novelist, essayist, playwright, journalist, editor, academic, and social activist from Kenya.

The Kenya of his birth and youth was a British settler colony (1895–1963). As an adolescent, he lived through the Mau Mau War of Independence (1952–1962), the central historical episode in the making of modern Kenya and a major theme in his early works. His works include: Weep Not, Child (London, 1964); The River Between (London, 1965); A Grain of Wheat (London, 1967); Secret Lives (London, 1969); and Petals of Blood, (London, 1977).

The year 1977 forced dramatic turns in Ngũgĩ’s life and career. Petals of Blood painted a harsh and unsparing picture of life in neocolonial Kenya. That same year, Ngũgĩ’s controversial play Ngaahika Ndeenda (“I Will Marry When I Want”), written with Ngũgĩ wa Mirii, was performed at Kamirithu Educational and Cultural Center, Limuru, in an open-air theater. Sharply critical of the inequalities and injustices of Kenyan society, Ngũgĩ’ was arrested and imprisoned without charge at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison. An account of those experiences can be found in his memoir Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary. After Amnesty International named him a Prisoner of Conscience, an international campaign secured his release a year later, December 1978. He resumed his writings and his activities in the theater, and in so doing continued to be an uncomfortable voice for the Moi dictatorship. While in Britain for the launch and promotion of Devil on the Cross, he learned about the Moi regime’s plot to eliminate him on his return. This forced him into exile, first in Britain (1982–1989) and then the United States (1989–2002). He remained in exile for the duration of the Moi dictatorship. When he and his wife, Njeeri, returned to Kenya in 2004 after 22 years in exile, they were attacked by four hired gunmen and narrowly escaped with their lives. Ngũgĩ’’s other works include: Caitaani Mũtharaba-inĩ (Nairobi, 1980; English translation: Devil on the Cross, London, 1982); Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary (London, 1982); Matigari ma Njirũũngi, Nairobi, 1986; English translation: Matigari, London, 1989); Homecoming (London, 1969); Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in Africa Literature (London, 1986); Moving the Centre: The Struggle for Cultural Freedoms (London, 1993); Writers in Politics: A Re-Engagement with Issues of Literature & Society (London, 1997); Penpoints, Gunpoints, and Dreams (Oxford, 1998); The Black Hermit (London, 1969); This Time Tomorrow: Three Plays (Nairobi, 1972); The Trial of Dedan Kimathi, with Micere Mugo (London, 1976); Ngaahika Ndeenda, with Ngũgĩ wa Mĩriĩ (Nairobi, 1980; English translation: I Will Marry When I Want, (London, 1982); Murogi wa Kagogo (Nairobi, 2004; English translation: Wizard of the Crow, New York, 2006); Something Torn and New: An African Renaissance (New York, 2009); and

Dreams in a Time of War: A Childhood Memoir (New York, 2010).

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o is currently working on Book Two of his memoirs: In the House of the Interpreter.

Nikki Giovanni

Nikki Giovanni is a world-renowned poet, writer, commentator, activist, and educator. Over the past 30 years, her outspokenness, in her writing and in lectures, has brought the eyes of the world upon her. One of the most widely read American poets, she prides herself on being “a Black American, a daughter, a mother, a professor of English.” Giovanni remains as determined and committed as ever to the fight for civil rights and equality. Always insisting on presenting the truth as she sees it, she has maintained a prominent place as a strong voice of the Black community. Her focus is on the individual, specifically, on the power one has to make a difference in oneself, and thus, in the lives of others.

Nikki Giovanni was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, and grew up in Lincoln Heights, an all-Black suburb of Cincinnati, Ohio. She and her sister spent their summers with their grandparents in Knoxville, and she graduated with honors from Fisk University, her grandfather’s alma mater, in 1968.  After receiving her Bachelor of Arts degree, she organized the Black Arts Festival in Cincinnati before entering graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University.

She published her first book of poetry, Black Feeling Black Talk, in 1968, and within the next year published a second book, thus launching her career as a writer. Early in her career, she was dubbed the “Princess of Black Poetry,” and over the course of more than three decades of publishing and lecturing, she has come to be called both a “National Treasure” and, most recently, one of Oprah Winfrey’s 25 “Living Legends.”

In her first two collections, Black Feeling, Black Talk (1968) and Black Judgement (1969), Giovanni reflects on the African-American identity. Recently, she has published Bicycles: Love Poems (William Morrow, 2009); Acolytes (HarperCollins, 2007); The Collected Poetry of Nikki Giovanni: 1968–1998 (2003); Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea: Poems and Not-Quite Poems (2002); Blues for All the Changes: New Poems (1999); Love Poems (1997); and Selected Poems of Nikki Giovanni (1996).

A lung cancer survivor, Giovanni has also contributed an introduction to the anthology Breaking the Silence: Inspirational Stories of Black Cancer Survivors (Hilton Publishing, 2005).

Many of Giovanni’s books have received awards and honors. Her autobiography, Gemini, was a finalist for the National Book Award; Love Poems, Blues: For All the Changes, Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea, Acolytes, and Hip Hop Speaks to Children: A Celebration of Poetry with a Beat were all honored with NAACP Image Awards. Blues: For All the Changes reached No. 4 on the Los Angeles Times’ best-seller list, a rare achievement for a book of poems. Most recently, her children’s picture book Rosa, about the civil rights legend Rosa Parks, became a Caldecott Honors Book, and Bryan Collier, the illustrator, was given the Coretta Scott King Award for best illustration. Rosa also reached No. 3 on The New York Times’ best-seller list. Shortly after its release, Bicycles: Love Poems reached No. 1 on Amazon.com for poetry.

Giovanni's spoken-word recordings have also achieved widespread recognition and honors. Her album Truth Is on Its Way, on which she reads her poetry against a background of gospel music, was a top 100 album and received the Best Spoken Word Album given by the National Association of Radio and Television Announcers. Her Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection, on which she reads and talks about her poetry, was one of five finalists for a Grammy Award.

Giovanni’s honors and awards have been steady and plentiful throughout her career. The recipient of some 25 honorary degrees, she has been named Woman of the Year by Ebony, Essence, Mademoiselle, and The Ladies’ Home Journal magazines. She was tapped for the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame and named an Outstanding Woman of Tennessee. Giovanni has also received Governor’s Awards from both Tennessee and Virginia. She was the first recipient of the Rosa L. Parks Woman of Courage Award, and she has also been awarded the Langston Hughes Medal for poetry. She is an honorary member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority and has received Life Membership and Scroll from The National Council of Negro Women. A member of PEN, she was honored for her life and career by The History Makers. She has received the keys to more than two dozen cities. A scientist who admires her work even named a new species of bat he discovered for her! Black Enterprise named her a Women of Power Legacy Award winner for work that expands opportunities for other women of color. The author of some 30 books for both adults and children, Nikki Giovanni is a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia.

Dr. Howard Dodson

Dr. Howard Dodson is an historian, educator, curator, and lecturer who has committed his professional life to the retrieval, preservation, interpretation, and dissemination of the history and culture of African and African-American peoples. For nearly 30 years, until his recent retirement last year, he served as chief of the New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, the world’s leading and most prestigious repository for materials and artifacts on Black cultural life.

Since 1984, Dodson has guided the Schomburg Center through major fund-raising and expansion projects, including successful capital campaigns and multimillion-dollar construction and renovation projects. In the spring of 1991, the Center celebrated its 65th anniversary with the opening of the newly expanded complex, which included an auditorium, an exhibition hall, the Moving Image and Recorded Sound Division, and additional space for acquisitions. By 2005, the Center had become recognized for its cultural and educational programs. The programming was carefully developed to highlight the resources of the library as a research center. Dodson told American Visions that “There has been the recurring question of the role educational and cultural programs and exhibits play in the life of an institution like this. We see our interpretive programming as a means of focusing attention on the collection and on the issues and themes in the African and African-American diasporan experience.”

The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture was founded by historian Arthur A. Schomburg, a Puerto Rican of African descent. The library provided the resources for many of the artists and intellectuals during the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. In 1926, the New York Public Library acquired Schomburg’s collection for its newly opened special branch on 135th Street, the Division of Negro Literature, History, and Prints. This acquisition formed the basis for today’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

The Schomburg is home to treasures such as a rare recording of a Marcus Garvey speech, a signed first edition of Phillis Wheatley’s poetry and documents signed by Toussaint L’Ouverture. The Schomburg Center’s yearly exhibitions feature art objects, photographs, documents, published works and artifacts drawn from its own holdings, as well as resources from other institutions. Each exhibition explores issues and themes in the history and culture of people of African descent throughout the world. The 2005 exhibition Malcolm X: A Search for the Truth offered audiences opportunities to view the Center’s extensive collection of Malcolm X’s published and unpublished writings. A highlight of Dodson’s tenure at the Schomburg was his involvement with the African Burial Ground project. In an interview with Contemporary Black Biography (CBB), Dodson explained that he sees the Center as the “platform for one mission: to foster an understanding of the history and culture of people of African descent.”

During his years at the Schomburg, Dodson continued the long tradition of preserving and disseminating Black literature and cultural artifacts. He also instituted the Schomburg’s scholars-in-residence program, which provides six- and 12-month fellowships and use of the Schomburg collections for scholars, researchers, and writers. According to Dodson, Schomburg was driven by a belief in the necessity of preserving and reconstructing the historical past of  “the American Negro…as a stimulating and inspiring tradition for the coming generations.”

Dodson was born in Chester, Pennsylvania; after completing high school, he attended West Chester State College, where he studied social studies and English, with an emphasis on secondary education. He went on to Villanova University where he earned an M.A. in U.S. history and political science. Dodson became the executive director of the Institute of the Black World in Atlanta in 1974, remaining there until 1979. At the same time, he taught classes at Emory University. Dodson returned to Washington, D.C., in 1979 as a consultant to the National Endowment for the Humanities. After leaving the NEH, Dodson was hired as the director of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture at the New York Public Library.

Dodson is a member of Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History (ASALH), National Council for Black Studies, Organization of American Historians, Southern Historical Association, and 100 Black Men. He has received numerous awards, including ASALH Service Award, 1976; Chairman’s Award, Black and Puerto Rican Caucus; Governor’s Award for African Americans of Distinction, 1982; honorary degree from Widener College, 1987

Dodson is the author of Becoming American: The African-American Journey (2009); In Motion: The African-American Migration Experience (2005); Jubilee: The Emergence of African-American Culture (2003),which traces that culture from its genesis in American slavery through emancipation to the turn of the 20th century; and The Black New Yorkers: The Schomburg Illustrated Chronology , first published in 1999.

Dodson was recently appointed the director of Howard University Libraries and its Moorland-Spingarn Research Center.