Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks (June 7, 1917 – December 3, 2000) was an American poet, author, and teacher. Her work often dealt with the personal celebrations and struggles of ordinary people in her community. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry on May 1, 1950, for Annie Allen,[1] making her the first African American to receive a Pulitzer Prize.[2][3]
Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks
June 7, 1917
Topeka, Kansas, U.S.
1930–2000
A Street in Bronzeville, Annie Allen, Winnie
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1950)
Robert Frost Medal (1989)
National Medal of Arts (1995)
2, including Nora Brooks Blakely
Throughout her prolific writing career, Brooks received many more honors. A lifelong resident of Chicago, she was appointed Poet Laureate of Illinois in 1968, a position she held until her death 32 years later.[4] She was also named the U.S. Poet Laureate for the 1985–86 term.[5] In 1976, she became the first African-American woman inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters.[6]
Family life[edit]
In 1939, Brooks married Henry Lowington Blakely, Jr., whom she met after joining Chicago's NAACP Youth Council.[6] They had two children: Henry Lowington Blakely III, and Nora Brooks Blakely.[2] Brooks' husband died in 1996.[26]
From mid-1961 to late 1964, Henry III served in the U.S. Marine Corps, first at Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego and then at Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay. During this time, Brooks mentored her son's fiancée, Kathleen Hardiman, in writing poetry. Upon his return, Blakely and Hardiman married in 1965.[15] Brooks had so enjoyed the mentoring relationship that she began to engage more frequently in that role with the new generation of young black poets.[15]
Gwendolyn Brooks died at her Chicago home on December 3, 2000, aged 83.[2] She is buried in Lincoln Cemetery.[27]
The Poetry Foundation lists these works among others:
Several collections of multiple works by Brooks were also published.[19]