Robert Hayden grew up in an abusive household. He became the first black U.S. poet laureate.
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Robert Hayden (4 August 1913 – 25 February 1980) grew up in a Detroit ghetto called Paradise Valley. He was small and severely nearsighted. Throughout his life, he fought against bouts of severe depression he called “dark nights of the soul”, referencing a sixteenth century poem by Saint John of the Cross. Even in his sadness, Hayden spoke poetry. His depression was multiplied by his upbringing in an abusive household.
He left his house to go to college. He left college in 1936 and published his first volume of poetry in 1940.
Soon after, he converted to the Baha’i faith.
While studying for his master’s degree at the University of Michigan, Hayden studied under the renowned poet, W.H. Auden.
Due to his Baha’i faith and his belief in the universality of man, Hayden never subscribed to the ideology of black separatism. He believed that humanity’s strength was in unity, not in separating on racial, ethnic, or national lines.
In 1976, he was named Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, a position that would become the United States Poet Laureate.
TL;DR
- Robert Hayden grew up in an abusive household. He became the first black person to hold the position of Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress
- In a time where black poets advocated radical separation from white people, Hayden advocated for a radical form of love and acceptance.
What You Should Do Now:
- Read “Those Winter Sundays”. Not my favorite Hayden poem but an important part of his bibliography.
- Read “Frederick Douglass” and “The Ballad of Nat Turner”.
- Read a few poems by black poets this week.
28 Days of Inspirational Black People:
- Ed Brooke
- Blanche Bruce
- Andrew Young
- Denys Cowan
- Antoine Fuqua
- John Singleton
- Countee Cullen
- Dennis Kimetto