Valuable written words by Black womxn writers

1964 portrait of James Baldwin. All photos courtesy of Sedat Pakay.Being out . . . one is really not very far out of the United States . . . One sees it better from a distance . . . from another place, from another country.-- James BaldwinJames Baldwin (1924-1987), the renowned American novelist, essayist, playwright, civil rights advocate and social critic, was an outspoken advocate for equality and respect for all citizens regardless of race, ethnicity, religion or sexual preference. His…

Maya Angelou (1928-2014), an American writer, is best known for "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" (1969), probably the best single book about what it was like to grow up Black under Jim Crow. She is also also known for the poems "Still I Rise" (1978) and "Phenomenal Woman" (1978). She was born Marguerite…

Readers could sense in Morrison’s fiction the influences of Ralph Ellison, the Bible and William Faulkner, among others, but her idiosyncratic music was her own.

Lillian Ross talks with Lorraine Hansberry about how she became a playwright.

James Baldwin and his mind-blowing literary work

George Saunders, Mary Karr, Jacqueline Woodson, Annette Gordon-Reed, and Alexander Chee commemorate the author Toni Morrison and the expansive influence of her work.

A new biography celebrates the life and legacy of Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gwendolyn Brooks, who wrote about ordinary black life using extraordinary language.

The playwright died at the age of thirty-four, but she left behind enough genius for lovers of literature to follow like a trail of generous crumbs, Vinson Cunningham writes.