![]() ![]() I also had a hint of what she wrote in the book about feeling like an outsider at times in Ghana and not being fully embraced as a diasporan coming home to the Motherland. ![]() When I got to Ghana and spent two weeks traveling around the country, I imagined Angelou holding court in places I visited, or at her house with major African-American activists and intellectuals, such as Malcolm X, on their visits to Accra. To read of her adventures in Ghana was energizing and added to the excitement I felt about my own trip. In this autobiography, Angelou writes about the years she lived in Ghana, where she did administrative work at a university in Accra, was a freelance journalist and also performed with Ghana's National Theatre. Just before I traveled to Ghana earlier this year, I reread her book, "All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes." It has always spoken to me because I love to travel, love meeting people and learning about their cultures. Angelou's poem "Phenomenal Woman," and the one she wrote and recited for President Bill Clinton's 1993 inauguration, "On the Pulse of Morning," have motivated many people. People who rarely or never pick up a book of poetry, can recite verses from her poetry. She said a love of poetry and wanting to recite it helped her through that period.Īngelou's writings have inspired people of all races, ages and economic groups. After the man was killed by those outraged by the crime, Angelou didn't speak for about six years to anyone but her younger brother, thinking her words in identifying him were the cause of the man's death. I was introduced to Angelou's writings when I was in elementary school and read one of her most well-known books, "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." I reread it as an adult because I was too young to fully understand this autobiographical work about Angelou's early years, which included being raped by her mother's boyfriend before she was a teenager. But they were done with a finesse that pulled the reader or listener in and left them, if not with a sense of hope for the future, with at least something to think about. Her poignant writings about her own pains, challenges and triumphs and issues involving civil rights, poverty and racial and social injustices, were brutally honest and on point. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |