Langston Hughes
“Let
America Be America Again”
An
International Symposium on the Art, Life & Legacy of Langston Hughes
February
7-10, 2002, University of Kansas
By
Chris Robinson
Imagine
following your favorite sports figure’s career. You tracked this player’s
career throughout college and then the pros. You saw this person mature in
his/her game. You check his/her stats regularly. You may have season tickets and
attend every home game. So, as luck may have it, you actually get an opportunity
to meet this athlete whom you have admired for so long. Of course, you would be
ecstatic. Right? Just translate
that excitement of sports to literature, language, and the incredible ability of
writers to manipulate language to sound like music or to express your personal
experiences. Then you will understand why I was ecstatic about attending “Let
America be America Again: An International Symposium on the Art, Life, and
Legacy of Langston Hughes,” which was held at the University of Kansas in
Lawrence. Before I divulge into my experiences and the purpose of the symposium,
I will tell you who Langston Hughes was and his significance as a writer.
Hughes is significant because he was the first African-American to secure
a living through his writing. By stating Hughes was the first African-American
author to make a living through his writing might not seem very important to
mention. However, one must take into consideration the time period in which he
wrote and contrast him with Anglo-American authors.
Hughes became famous during the Harlem Renaissance. During the 1920’s
to 1940’s, Harlem, New York was the Mecca for African-American artisans. For
the first time, African-Americans were being taken seriously collectively for
their work in literature, dance, theatre, and art.
Take the historical context into consideration and compare it with
authors such as James Fennimore Cooper and Mark Twain, these Anglo-American male
writers were able to procure employment by their writing in the late 1800’s
and early 1900’s----well before the Harlem Renaissance.
Another reason Langston Hughes is important was his ability and his
deliberateness in capturing the life and language of working-class
African-Americans. His best-known works, the “Weary Blues” and the “Negro
Speaks of Rivers”, illustrate the difficulties of living as an African in
America and the African-American’s connection to rivers, which leads them back
to Africa.
Although Hughes is considered a central figure during Harlem Renaissance
and is well known for his poetry, he wrote until his death in 1967 and in
variety of genres, including screenplays, operas, essays, and weekly columns in
the Chicago Defender, novels, and
books for children, short stories, and two autobiographies.
Have you guessed by now Langston Hughes is my favorite author? The fact
that Hughes is my favorite author may lead you to understand why I was so
excited about attending the symposium. Yes,
I was excited about people discussing Hughes, but that was just the half of it.
It was the people who were
discussing Hughes I found really exciting.
The pre-conference event featured Danny
Glover performing a variety of Langston Hughes’s poems. I have
never heard any of Hughes’s poems read aloud except by my own voice. Danny
Glover so eloquently performed Langston Hughes’s poems. He completely
enthralled the audience. After the performance, Glover graciously answered
questions from the audience. If any one ever thought of Mr. Glover as just an
actor, he quickly dispelled any ideas they may have.
His acting career is not the totality of the man; he is also a political
activist who does not mind expressing his views on oppression throughout the
world.
Danny
Glover was not the only celebrity who attended the conference, the other
celebrities were: Amiri Baraka, Mari Evans (from Indianapolis), Eugene Redmond,
Ishmael Reed, Robert Pinsky (poet laureate), Paule Marshall, Sonia Sanchez, and
Arnold Rampersad (Arthur Ashe and Langston Hughes’s biographer).
Eugene Redmond read his poem concerning the September 11 tragedy at a
luncheon. Paule Marshall talked about her personal experiences with Langston
Hughes and his influence in her development as a writer. I met Amiri Baraka,
Ishmael Reed, and Sonia Sanchez at the book signing.
Another
thrilling surprise about the symposium was some of the presenters were from
Tokyo, Canada, Russia, Paris, Senegal, and Germany.
Although it should not be a surprised that presenters from these
countries were in attendance; Hughes was a world traveler. He spent a year in
Paris, Russia, Senegal, Spain, Italy, and lived for many years in Mexico. I was
happy to see the United States and other countries honor a man who spent his
life writing about the lives of common, everyday people---no matter where they
lived.
The
various sessions of the conference was held concurrently, which I found it
difficult to decide what session I wanted to attend---all of the assemblies
sounded interesting. However, the
ones I attended were: “From Boys to Men: Challenge of Black (Auto)
Biography”, which discussed the problems of Black autobiographies and
biographies; “Negro Mothers, Midnight Dancers, and Madame Alberta K. Johnson:
Hughes’s Womenfolk” , which
presented the various types of Black women found in Hughes’s poetry”, and
“Hughes Criticism and the Critics”, which
examined the lack of serious
scholarship of Hughes’s works.
The
symposium closed on Saturday night with a poetry reading, actually a poetry jam
session. The jam session was held at the Lawrence Community Theatre, although
Hughes knew the building as the Lawrence Public Library.
The poets ranged from locals to professionals just as Kevin Powell,
MTV’s “Real World, San Francisco” and the editor of Step
into a World: A Global Anthology of the New Black Literature, Tony Medina,
author of Love to Langston, Jessica
Care Moore, writer and producer of the film “Slam” that won the 1998
Sundance Film Festival and CEO of Moore Black Press, as well as Willie Perdomo,
author of Where a Nickel Costs a Dime
and the children’s book, Visiting
Langston.
The
symposium was inspiring. It was inspiring to be among people with various
talents and who were not afraid to use them. The conference encouraged me to
read and to write more poetry. By attending the symposium, I was able to express
my views on Langston Hughes, to gather some new information, and to network with
people who were interested in what I was doing with my Masters’ degree. Also,
I was able to meet authors who I admired for a long time.
http://www.poets.org/poets/poets.cfm?prmID=84
http://www.redhotjazz.com/hughes.html
Books
By or About Langston Hughes
Hughes,
Langston. The Big Sea: an autobiography. New York: Knopf, 1940
---I
wonder as I wander: an autobiographical journey. New York: Hill and Wang,
---The
Best of Simple. New York: Hill
and Wang, 1961.
Jemie,
Onwuchekwa. Langston
Hughes: an introduction to the poetry.
New York: Columbia
Miller,
Baxter R. Langston
Hughes and Gwendolyn Brooks: a reference guide.
Boston:
Rampersad,
Arnold and David Roessel. Ed. The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes.