Ward, Jesmyn
1977-present · Contribution: 2008-present
Fiction and memoir centered on poor Black families and communities on the Mississippi Gulf Coast; novels 'Salvage the Bones' (2011) and 'Sing, Unburied, Sing' (2017) and the memoir 'Men We Reaped' (2013)
Portraits are AI-generated interpretations, not photographs.
Impact on the world
The first woman and first African American to win the National Book Award for Fiction twice (2011 and 2017); a MacArthur Fellow (2017) whose lyrical work explores family, race, poverty, and the legacy of slavery.
Life & background
African-American writer born April 1, 1977 in Berkeley, CA; raised in DeLisle, MS. BA and MA, Stanford; MFA, University of Michigan. Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Tulane University.
Sources
- Encyclopædia Britannica; National Book Foundation
More in Literature & Writing
Angelou, Maya
1928-2014
Author of 'I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings'; first African American woman to recite an original poem at a U.S. presidential inauguration
Baldwin, James
1924-1987
Author of 'Go Tell It on the Mountain' and 'The Fire Next Time'; one of the first major Black writers to write openly about homosexuality
Baraka, Amiri
1934-2014
Poetry, drama, fiction, and jazz/blues criticism; the play 'Dutchman' (1964), poetry collections 'Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note' (1961) and 'The Dead Lecturer' (1964), and the music history 'Blues People' (1963)
Brooks, Gwendolyn
1917-2000
First African American to win a Pulitzer Prize, awarded in 1950 for her poetry collection 'Annie Allen'