Gwendolyn Brooks

GWENDOLYN BROOKS

David Huang
F block English
Dilworth
3/27/15

BIOGRAPHY
Gwendolyn Brooks was born in 1917, June 7 in Topeka Kansas. When she was young, her father, a janitor aspiring to be a doctor, and her mother, a teacher, decided that they should move to Chicago. There, Brooks developed a love for reading and writing and eventually published her first poem, Eventide, when she was 13. She started publishing poems regularly for the Chicago Defender, an African American newspaper popular in Chicago. In 1939, she married Henry Lowington Blakely. Brooks worked as a secretary to support herself while engaging in poetry workshops. Brooks became recognized nationally in this period , receiving an award from The Midwestern Writer's Conference. Brooks first book of poetry published in 1945, A Street In Bronzeville, was a huge success and received extremely well in the African American community. Her second book, Annie Allen, won the Pulitzer, making Gwendolyn Brooks the first African American ever to win a Pulitzer Prize. She continued to publish poems, winning other notable prizes, and in 1960 she started her career as a creative writing teacher. She taught extensively in colleges around the country. On December 3, 2000, Gwendolyn Brooks passed away at age 83 of cancer.

WORKS
Gwendolyn Brooks published numerous collections of her works of poetry, her first book, A Street In Bronzeville was recieved well by the black community, and, in Modern Black Poets: A Collection of Critical Essays, Richard K. Barksdale described this collection as "devoted to small, carefully cerebrated, terse portraits of the Black urban poor," . Annie Allen was her second book and told the story of an African American girl's life and her thoughts on death, killing and racism in three parts in poetic stanzas. It was also the winner of the coveted Pulitzer Prize, making her the first African American as well as the first African American woman to ever win a Pulitzer. 
PREZI 



INFLUENCE & LEGACY
Gwendolyn Brooks was a prominent civil rights activist in her time. Her poems often reflected issues of racism and political integrity, and gave readers insights to the situation of the black urban poor around the country. Her poems took not only a political stance, but also reflected on social issues, such as women, and how they fit into society. Her book, Annie Allen, tells an inspiring story of a young black girl discovering unsettling facts of life and racism. Her inspiration for many of her poems came from prominent black leaders, such as Nelson Mandela and his wife, Winnie Mandela. Her poems, as Bruce Cook said were "neither bitter nor vengeful" but more about bitterness than bitterness itself, and many of her poems, such as The Bean Eaters are in fact bittersweet, dealing with poverty and old age, but more to inform us of the bad situation of the pair, then to ask for sympathy for the poor old couple.

THE BEAN EATERS

They eat beans mostly, this old yellow pair.
Dinner is a casual affair.
Plain chipware on a plain and creaking wood, 
Tin flatware.
Two who are Mostly Good.
Two who have lived their day,
But keep on putting on their clothes
And putting things away.
And remembering . . .
Remembering, with twinklings and twinges,    
As they lean over the beans in their rented back room that  

is full of beads and receipts and dolls and cloths,
          tobacco crumbs, vases and fringes.


Audio for The Bean Eaters

ANALYSIS
The Bean Eaters is one of Gwendolyn Brook's most famous poems and was first published as the title poem in her third collection of poems, The Bean Eaters, in 1960. As Gwendolyn Brook's poetry career progressed, her poems started to focus more on Civil Rights and racism in America. This poem, although it does not send a direct political message, talks about an old couple who do poorly financially and whose kids have moved on. Brooks gives insight on a typical "old yellow pair", showing poverty that some African-Americans suffered their whole lives. This poem doesn't have much of a volta, at line 8, the mood changes somewhat to a gloomy wistfulness, but is still a subdued tone that lasts throughout the poem.

Works Cited
www.poetryfoundation.org
www.biography.com 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anKeKmfRCqc

Pictures
http://aalbc.com/authors/gwendolyn.htm