Ernest J. Gaines was born on a plantation in Louisiana. Now, he owns the plantation.
Ernest James Gaines (born January 15, 1933) was born on a plantation in Point Coupee Parish, Louisiana. He was of the fifth generation of his family to be born on that plantation. He and his eleven brothers and sisters lived in the slave quarters. Gaines and his family spent most of their time picking cotton. In many ways, the life of sharecroppers in the Deep South was indistinguishable from the lives of slaves two or three generations earlier. One major difference was that Gaines went to school when he wasn’t working in the field.
Later, he moved to California so that he could continue his education. He attended San Francisco State University. While there, he published his first short story, The Turtles.
He published his first novel, Catherine Carmier, in 1964. His eighth novel, A Lesson Before Dying, published in 1993, was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. The later novel revolves around the trial of an innocent black man wrongfully accused of murder. The story takes place between World War II and the Civil Rights Era, the height of the Jim Crow South and tackles issues of race and inequality.
Gaines now lives with his wife on the plantation where he grew up.
TL;DR
- Ernest J. Gaines was born on a plantation. He grew up picking cotton and going to school intermittently.
- He wrote A Lesson Before Dying which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
- He now owns the plantation where he grew up.
What You Should Do Now:
- Read A Lesson Before Dying.
- Read another novel by a black author this month.
28 Days of Inspirational Black People:
- Ed Brooke
- Blanche Bruce
- Andrew Young
- Denys Cowan
- Antoine Fuqua
- John Singleton
- Countee Cullen
- Dennis Kimetto
- Robert Hayden
- Lee Daniels
- Anthony Mackie/Falcon
- Val James
- Abebe Bikila
- Steve McQueen