The Poetry of James Weldon Johnson

Written by James Weldon Johnson

Narrated by Danny Swopes, Jesse Wright and Ghizela Rowe

James Weldon Johnson was born in Jacksonville, Florida on June 17th 1871. His mother, Helen, a musician and a public school teacher initially home-schooled him giving him a love of both English literature and European music.

At 16 his education moved to Atlanta University and he graduated with a degree in 1894.

In 1904 Johnson helped in Theodore Roosevelt's presidential bid. On winning Roosevelt appointed him as US consul at Puerto Cabello, Venezuela in 1906 and then Nicaragua from 1909.

Johnson worked for the NAACP from 1916 as a field secretary, organizing local chapters. To counter race riots and lynching’s he organized mass demonstrations, such as a silent protest parade of over ten thousand African Americans down New York’s Fifth Avenue in July 1917.

In 1920 Johnson was elected to manage the NAACP, the first African American to hold this position. That same year he was dispatched to monitor conditions in Haiti and described in The Nation the brutal occupation and also offered remedies. During the 1920’s he was one of the major inspirations of the Harlem Renaissance

In the midst of all this he continued to write novels, poems, and folklore. In 1917, he saw published ‘50 Years and Other Poems’. In 1922, he edited ‘The Book of American Negro Poetry’, which the Academy of American Poets calls "a major contribution to the history of African-American literature." In 1927 followed ‘God's Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse’.

One of the first African-American professors at NYU he was also, later, a professor of creative literature and writing at Fisk University. His career spanned several elements; education, the diplomatic corps, civil rights activism, literature, poetry, and music.

James Weldon Johnson died on June 26th, 1938 whilst vacationing in Wiscasset, Maine when his car was hit by a train.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Copyright Group
• Release date: Mar 3, 2020
• ISBN: 9781839672972

James Weldon Johnson

James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938) was an African American writer and civil rights activist. Born in Jacksonville, Florida, he obtained an education from a young age, first by his mother, a musician and teacher, and then at the Edwin M. Stanton School. In 1894, he graduated from Atlanta University, a historically Black college known for its rigorous classical curriculum. With his brother Rosamond, he moved to New York City, where they excelled as songwriters for Broadway. His poem “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing” (1899), set to music by Rosamond, eventually became known as the “Negro National Anthem.” Over the next several decades, he dedicated himself to education, activism, and diplomacy. From 1906 to 1913, he worked as a United States Consul, first in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela, and then in Nicaragua. He married Grace Nail, an activist and artist, in 1910, and would return to New York with her following the end of his diplomatic career. While in Nicaragua, he wrote and anonymously published The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (1912), a novel exploring the phenomenon of racial passing. In 1917, Johnson began his work with the NAACP, eventually rising to the role of executive secretary. He became known as a towering figure of the Harlem Renaissance, writing poems and novels as well as compiling such anthologies as The Book of American Negro Poetry (1922). For his contributions to African American culture as an artist and patron, his activism against lynching, and his pioneering work as the first African American professor at New York University, Johnson is considered one of twentieth century America’s leading cultural figures.