I Am a Black Woman

by Mari Evans

Potent and powerful poetry, including her hallmark poem "I am a Black Woman"

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction

160 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1970

About the author

Mari Evans attended the University of Toledo and later taught at several other schools, including Purdue University, West Lafayette, Ind., and Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. She began five years of writing, producing, and directing for an Indianapolis television program, “The Black Experience,” in 1968, the same year her first poetry collection, Where Is All the Music?, was published. With her second collection, I Am a Black Woman (1970), she gained acclaim as an important new poet. Her poem “Who Can Be Born Black” was often anthologized.

Her later collections include Nightstar: 1973–1978 (1981), whose poems praise blues artists and community heroes and heroines, and A Dark and Splendid Mass (1992). Continuum, published in 2007, contains classic poems from Evans's previous collections as well as new work inflected by the same unique insight into African American life that defined her earlier oeuvre. In her works for young readers, Evans often touched on difficult topics such as child abuse ( Dear Corinne: Tell Somebody, 1999) and adolescent relationships ( I'm Late: The Story of LaNeese and Moonlight and Alisha Who Didn't Have Anyone of Her Own, 2005). Evans's plays include River of My Song (produced 1977) and the musical Eyes (produced 1979), an adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God. She edited the anthology Black Women Writers (1950–1980): A Critical Evaluation (1984) and published Clarity as Concept: A Poet's Perspective (2006), a collection of essays commenting on African American politics and family life.


Oxford Companion to African American Literature: Mari Evans

Reviews

[B Sarv · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is another one that I inherited from my mother's shelves of poetry many years ago after she passed away. I have really been fortunate. Every time I pick up another one of the books she bought around 50 years ago I find a treasure.

Unlike Alice Walker, Nikki Giovanni and Audre Lorde, I had never heard of Mari Evans before I picked up this collection of her poems. So many of the works in this book resonated with me that I wondered why I hadn't heard of her before. But then, when one thinks about it, poetry is not mainstream and certainly Black women's poetry does not nearly get the attention it deserves.

I don't know how accessible these works are to the modern reader but the themes brought out and the power of the messages are just as relevant today as they were when they were first written. It helps that I am older than the book because some of the allusions she makes in a few of the poems are things I can remember. Still, one need not have a grasp of history to connect to Prof. Evan's work.

Happily, when I read her biography, it was clear that she led a full, active, community oriented life and impacted many lives. She lived well into her 90s.

It was a pleasure to read her work and if you can I recommend you find her poems. Some of those I liked in particular were:

I Am A Black Woman
To Mother and Steve
In the Wake of My Departed
Marrow of My Bone
And the hotel room held only him
Apologia
Rout
The Great Civil Rights Law (A. D. 1964)
The Rebel
Flames
A good assassination should be quiet
Uhuru
and
Who Can Be Born Black.

Maybe some of these are available to read.

I hope you get the opportunity.

[Agnes · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a great poetry collection- balanced-evocative

I particularly liked
"Thin-Sliced"
"Here, hold my hand"
"Where have you gone"
"Uhuru Uberalles!"
Grits & Rice Grains"
"The Alarm Clock"
"Vive Noir"

[Alyssa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading my Indianapolis elders

[Faloni © · Rating 5 out of 5]

🌹 🤍🌹 🤍💕💕🌹 🤍🌹 🤍🌹 🤍🌹💕💕🤍 🌹 🤍💕💕🌹 🌹 💕💕🤍🌹 ❤️🌹🤍💕💕🤍🌹🤍 ✔️I'm so impatient.🥰💃💍🤭⁉️ 🌹🤍💕💕 🌹 🌹🤍 🌹 🤍🌹 💕💕🤍🌹 🤍🌹 🤍🌹🤍🤍 🌹🤍🌹 🌹🤍❤️ 🤍🌹 🤍💕💕❤️🌹

[Sam Snideman · Rating 4 out of 5]

there is a lot of powerful stuff in this small volume.

[Tom Davis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Takes me back to the 60s, which is no surprise since that is when it was written.