THIS WEEK’S MUSE
MAYA ANGELOU
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
Maya Angelou was an American writer and civil rights activist. She is seen as one of the most important writers of the last fifty years, with a voice, writing style, and a fundamental confidence in the goodness of people that was informed by a time before she published her first book in 1969.
Born Marguerite Annie Johnson in 1928, in St. Louis, Missouri, Angelou spent much of childhood with her grandmother, in Stamps, Arkansas after her parents divorced. Aged seven, she was raped by her mother’s boyfriend who served just one day in jail. He was murdered a few days after his release, by those determined to see justice done.
Because Angelou named the man, she also felt responsible for his death and didn’t speak publicly for over five years. “I thought, my voice killed him,” she said later. “I killed that man, because I told his name. And then I thought I would never speak again, because my voice would kill anyone.” She eventually overcame it, thanks to the help of Bertha Flowers, family friend in Stamps. “You do not love poetry, not until you speak it,” Flowers said to Angelou.
Despite the wide condemnation of interracial relationships in the 1950s, and strong disapproval of her mother, Angelou married Greek musician Tosh Angelos. By 1954 the marriage was over, and Angelou was making a living as a singer and dancer at the Purple Onion in San Francisco. She had changed her name to Maya Angelou, from her brother’s and ex-husband’s nickname for her— “Mya Sister.”
The following year Angelou toured Europe with a production of Porgy and Bess. In 1957, she recorded her first album, Miss Calypso and appeared in a show performing her own songs. “Music was my refuge,” she said. “I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.”
In the early 1960s she lived in Accra, Ghana where she worked as a freelance writer, a broadcaster on national radio, as well as writing and performing for Ghana’s National Theatre. Later in the decade, deeply affected by the deaths of her friends Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., Angelou returned to the US and wrote, produced, and narrated Blacks, Blues, Black!, a documentary series about blues music and Black Americans’ African heritage.
“My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.”
Soon after, Robert Loomis—editor at Random House—challenged Angelou to write about herself. She responded with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, published in 1969, the first in a long line of hugely successful books. In it she explored her identity, rape, racism, literacy, and women’s lives in a male-dominated society. Maya, the book’s central figure, has been called “a symbolic character for every black girl growing up in America.”
“You can only become truly accomplished at something you love. Don’t make money your goal. Instead pursue the things you love doing and then do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off of you.”
Long before global success, and aside from being a recording artist, dancer, and actor, her other jobs have been listed variously as: streetcar conductor, short-order cook, waitress, paint-stripper, sex worker, editor, university administrator, teacher, and civil rights activist. She addresses all of them in her books, telling the stories with great humor, dignity, and style—sometimes revising and refreshing them between books to suit the narrative—and using them to inform and shape her writing.
“Life is pure adventure, and the sooner we realize that, the quicker we will be able to treat life as art.”
HAPPENING
NATIONAL POETRY MONTH PROGRAMMING
Friday, April 8, from 7–9pm
Open Mic Night
With Featured Poets Susan Berlin , John Bonanni, and Lucile Burt
Join us for a spectacular evening of poetry at the Cultural Center of Cape Cod with featured poets Susan Berlin, John Bonanni, and Lucile Burt.
After the featured readings, we will open it up to our audience for the open mic portion.
Sign up to read as you come into the Owl Hall. Celebrate poetry month in the company of fellow poets and poetry enthusiasts!
Free event but preregistration is required.
