African American Poetry: A Digital Anthology Main Menu Full Text Collection: Books Published by African American Poets, 1870-1929 Long list of 100+ full texts books of poetry available on this "Anthology" Author Pages: Bios and Full Text Collections List of African American poets on African American Periodical Poetry (1900-1928) A collection of African Amerian Periodical Poetry, mostly focused on 1900-1928 Areas of Interest: Topics and Themes African American Poetry: Anthologies of the 1920s Poetry by African American Women (1890-1930): A Reader and Guide Open access textbook introducing readers to Poetry by Black Women Exploring Datasets related to African American poetry About This Site: Mission Statement, Contributors, and Recent Updates An account of the history and evolution of this site by the site editor. Further Reading / Works Cited

James Weldon Johnson: Author Page

213
James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938) was a prominent civil rights activist, composer, poet, and editor. He is best known for composing "Lift Every Voice and Sing" (1899) sometimes referred to as the "Black National Anthem," but he rose to prominence in the literary world as the author of Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (1912), his first collection of poems, Fifty Years and Other Poems (1917), and his edited collection The Book of American Negro Poetry (1922). The first collection gets its title from Johnson's 1913 poem, "Fifty Years," celebrating the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation; that poem was originally published in the New York Times. 

In 1927, Johnson published another volume of poetry -- in the forms of verse sermons -- called God's Trombones. A digital edition of that book is available here. It contains "The Creation," a poem Johnson had first published in 1920, and which was widely anthologized during the Harlem Renaissance. 

Johnson was born in Jacksonville, Florida; his mother had migrated from the Bahamas, and had maternal ancestors who had emigrated from Haiti shortly after the Haitian revolution. For his undergraduate degree (1891-1894), Johnson attended Atlanta University, a Historically Black university.In 1897, Johnson passed the bar exam in Florida, becoming the first African American to be admitted to the Florida Bar since Reconstruction. This legal training served Johnson well in his political career: Johnson was appointed to serve as U.S. consul in Venezuela and Nicaragua between 1906 and 1913 (and this experience is reflected in his writing -- several of his poems engage with Latin American issues). Johnson also occupied a position of prominence with the NAACP, serving as its executive director between 1920 and 1930. 

Alongside his careers as a civil rights activist and poet/editor, Johnson also had a brief career as a songwriter. As is well known, Johnson and his brother, J. Rosamond Johnson, moved to New York together in  the early 1890s, joining a wave of Black migration commonly known as the Great Migration. Together, the Johnson brothers were active songwriters, composing more than 200 songs, many of which were performed on Broadway. 
 

Contents of this path:

  1. James Weldon Johnson, "Fifty Years and Other Poems" (1917) (Full text)
  2. James Weldon Johnson, Preface to the "Book of American Negro Poetry" (1922)
  3. James Weldon Johnson, "God's Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse" (1927) (full text)
  4. Poems by James Weldon Johnson in "The Book of American Negro Poetry" (1922)
  5. "The Book of American Negro Poetry" (1922) Ed. James W. Johnson
  6. Robert Kerlin, Chapter 7, "The Poetry of Protest" (Georgia Douglas Johnson, James Weldon Johnson, Lucian Watkins, Carrie Clifford, Claude McKay)
  7. James Weldon Johnson, "Fifty Years" (1913)
  8. James Weldon Johnson, "Father, Father Abraham" (1913)
  9. James Weldon Johnson, "The Black Mammy" (1915)
  10. James Weldon Johnson, "The White Witch" (1915)
  11. James Weldon Johnson, "Brothers" (1916)
  12. James Weldon Johnson, "To America" (1917)
  13. James Weldon Johnson, "The Creation" (1920)
  14. James Weldon Johnson, "My City" (1922)
  15. James Weldon Johnson, "Go Down Death: A Funeral Sermon" (1927)
  16. James Weldon Johnson, "Let My People Go" (1927)
  17. James Weldon Johnson, "Listen Lord: A Prayer" (1927)
  18. James Weldon Johnson, "Prodigal Son" (1927)
  19. James Weldon Johnson, "The Judgment Day" (1927)
  20. James Weldon Johnson, "The Tale of a Kitten" (1920)
  21. James Weldon Johnson, Biographical Note in "Caroling Dusk" (1927)

This page references: