The Garden Thrives: Twentieth-Century African-American Poetry

by Clarence Major (Editor)

A comprehensive anthology of African-American poetry presents a rich selection of works by one hundred poets who span the century, including Langston Hughes, Richard Wright, Gwendolyn Brooks, Ishmael Reed, and Alice Walker. Simultaneous.

Genres: Poetry, African American

512 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Currently a professor of twentieth century American literature at the University of California at Davis, Clarence Major is a poet, painter and novelist who was born in Atlanta and grew up in Chicago.
Clarence Major was a finalist for the National Book Awards (1999). He is recipient of many awards, among them, a National Council on The Arts Award (1970), a Fulbright (1981-1983), a Western States Book Award (1986) and two Pushcart prizes--one for poetry, one for fiction. Major is a contributor to many periodicals and anthologies in the USA, Europe, South America and Africa. He has served as judge for The National Book Awards, the PEN-Faulkner Award and twice for the National Endowment for The Arts. Major has traveled extensively and lived in various parts of the United States and for extended periods in France and Italy. He has lectured and read his work in dozens of U. S. universities as well as in England, France, Liberia, West Germany, Ghana, and Italy.

Reviews

[William · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anthologies can be judged by the scope of contributors considered, the quality of the work represented, and then, of course, the vision of the editor himself.

The Garden Thrives surveys 20th C African American poetry from a stance in the mid-90s. As the editor Clarence Major notes, this is the first major survey since Arnold Adoff's wonderful volume, The Poetry of Black America: Anthology of the 20th Century. The poems are arranged chronologically by author birthdate, the difficulty being necessarily that the poets write over a number of years, responding to shifts in culture, interactions with other poets and writers, as well as exploring their own literary styles.

In a lifetime of writing, Langston Hughes' voice and subject matter shift considerably, moving from the vernacular to the political. Or take Robert Hayden whose material ranges from the experimental Runagate Runagate to the classic, Those Winter Mornings (alas, both go missing in this volume). On a more contemporary front Yusef Komunyakaa has generated some spectacular meditations on jazz, experimented with more surreal subjects, and gave a hard edged voice to war in Dien Cai Dau -- these voices, too, are missing. The reality is that no anthology can hope to do justice to any individual poet, and at best only give an inkling of what is in store.

In terms of the breadth of poetry, Major shows a familiarity with a great number of African American poets. Most of the major names are here, perhaps the one significant missing poet would be Dudley Randall; the late Carolyn Rodgers, too, probably should have had a place as one of the women in the Black Arts Movement of the 60s.

As to the poems themselves, Major is a less-reliable editor. As already noted with Hayden, a limitation of five or six poems necessarily means making choices. Especially for the earlier 20th C poets, the editorial hand is a little unsteady, selecting more obscure poems, or perhaps worse, poetry that is fairly tame. That said, there remain some interesting surprises. Sterling Brown's Foreclosure about a flood is very striking. The Countee Cullen poems were also very smart in tone. From the post-war era, Everett Hoagland's Gorée is an excellent find. The inclusion of slam poets Patricia Smith and Paul Beatty brought plenty of delight. Major also captures some of the early work of Kevin Young; this is another poet who keeps delivering quality.

Read as a whole, one can also catch Major's own take on poetry. Of special note is the breadth he gives to women's voices. In the poetry of the sixties in particular, African American women were often tightly bound within a male shell. The language and rhetoric were dominantly male. By contrast, Major helps uncover Shange Ntozake's delightful Oh, I'm Ten Months Pregnant. There is also a notable academic or formalist bent. Clearly Major loves the spare lines of William Carlos Williams. This personal preference is also reflected or reinforced by the poets themselves, where the editor turns to academically prepared writers, many with advanced degrees from writing programs and/or the Ivies. The result is a poetry that is too often less direct, more (self) reflective, a poetry without enough heat.

So, three stars.