An Appreciation for Amiri Baraka: Remembering a Remarkable Voice in American Literary History

Year 2019, Issue: 51, 7 - 21, 01.11.2019

Dike Okoro

Abstract

Amiri Baraka was indeed one of America’s greatest writers
and, in fact, it would be amiss for me to eschew my personal contact
with him in the 1990s. Our paths crossed during the 1998 Gwendolyn
Brooks Writers’ Conference in Chicago, when a fellow graduate
student and I were selected by Chicago State University’s literature
program to perform Robert Hayden’s “Runagate Runagate” as an
opening act to what would later amount to a spirited and emotional
speech/poetry reading by Baraka. I have cherished the opportunity
and remain ever so grateful to have graced the same stage with an
author of such monumental stature. His contribution to black literature
and the American literary tradition is unparalleled. He is accredited
as the co-founder of the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s and “one
of America’s most important literary figures” (Chideya). Indeed, like
many great writers, Baraka had his regrets during the later years of
his career but seemed to have handled them appropriately before he
passed away. In the introduction to his glowing book of essays, Home:
Social Essays, he admits, “One heavy and aggravating problem with
[my] early writings is that I’ve long since changed my views on some
topics” (15). He prances through several examples, specifically noting
his indulgence in Marxism, admitting: “For instance, the homophobic
language in several of the essays … is wrongheaded and unscientific”.
This shift from his rhetoric in the 1970s, for good reasons,
suggests what many great writers have pointed out about writing and its
influence on the writer. Perhaps this seems to be what James Baldwin
attempted to explain when he observes, “Unless a writer is extremely
old when he dies, in which case he has probably become a neglected
institution, his death must always seem untimely. This is because a real
writer is always shifting and changing and searching”. I agree
with Baldwin. Perhaps when Baraka’s corpus is re-examined to situate
his influence on writers from the younger generation and writers
belonging to other literary traditions but whose hindsight parallels his,
he will be remembered as one poet, playwright, essayist and cultural
spokesperson, whose voice and visionary commitment helped in
settling anxieties in what is today recognized globally as American
literature.

Keywords

American Literature, Amiri Baraka, American Poetry

References

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