William Stanley Braithwaite
William Stanley Beaumont Braithwaite (born December 6, 1878 in Boston , Massachusetts , † June 8, 1962 in New York City ) was an American poet , anthologist and literary critic .
Career
William Stanley Beaumont Braithwaite was the second of five children. He was born into a posh, upper-middle-class family in Boston. His father, William Smith Braithwaite, was a member of a well-known and wealthy family from British Guiana . His mother, Emma DeWolfe, was the daughter of a slave from North Carolina . During his early childhood, Braithwaite enjoyed comfort and privilege. However, with the death of his father in 1886, the family quickly became impoverished. Emma Braithwaite was forced to take on unskilled jobs, while young William had to leave school at the age of twelve to find employment. He took a job as a typesetter at a publishing house in Boston, which opened the world of literature to him. Braithwaite was particularly fascinated by the works of the British poets John Keats , William Wordsworth and Robert Burns . Largely self-taught , Braithwaite expanded his knowledge and pursued a career as a poet with great determination. In this regard, he first published his work in the Boston newspapers. In 1904 he brought out his first volume of poetry, Lyrics of Life and Love. In 1906 he took up a position as a literary writer with the Boston Evening Transcript , which he held until 1931. During this time he published a second volume of poetry, The House of Falling Leaves, in 1908 , as well as occasional essays and verses in Atlantic Monthly , Scribner's, and The North American Review.
Though little talented as a poet, he became one of the most influential scholars and critics on poetry, as well as an editor of poetry and literary works, in the early twentieth century. Through his newspaper column, he criticized and commented on most poets, both black and white, in the early twentieth century. Shortly after starting his column in 1906, he published his first of three anthologies , The Book of Elizabethan Verse. These anthologies established his reputation as a literary scholar. Between 1913 and 1929 he published an annual anthology of new poems, the Anthology of Magazine Verse. Inclusion in Braithwaite's annual anthology was an award for young poets at the time. These included Robert Frost and Amy Lowell , but also black poets such as Langston Hughes , Countee Cullen and James Weldon Johnson .
Braithwaite was an exception among African American writers in the early twentieth century. As a poet, he took his literary inspiration from Keats. In his works, however, he avoided racial issues and everything that would label him as a black poet. He spent much of his career in white institutions. During this time he earned a reputation as a literary critic and promoter of poetry, but not as an Afro-American scholar. This does not mean that he isolated himself from the African Americans. On the contrary, he was one of the most important figures in the Harlem Renaissance , offering advice, help and often a place to publish to young black writers . For Braithwaite, the greatest achievements in poetry came from the expression of aesthetic beauty, not from political polemics or even racial identity.
In 1935, Braithwaite took up a position as professor of creative writing at Atlanta University . Braithwaite held the post until 1945, when he returned to Harlem in 1946 . There he spent the rest of his life working on his autobiography and other book projects. He died in Harlem in 1962 at the age of 83.
Honors
Braithwaite was awarded the Spingarn Medal in 1918 by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) , which recognizes African Americans for outstanding merit and achievement.
family
Braithwaite met his future wife Emma Kelly in 1902, who was then working in New Hampshire . The couple married the following year. The marriage resulted in three daughters and four sons: Fiona Lydia Rossetti (Mrs. Merrill Carter), Katherine Keats (Mrs. William Arnold), William Stanley Beaumont, Jr., Edith (Mrs. Carman Agard), Paul Ledoux, Arnold DeWolfe and Francis Robinson.
literature
- Finkelman, Paul: Encyclopedia of African American History, 1896 to the Present: From the Age of Segregation to the Twenty-first Century Five-volume Set , Oxford University Press, 2009, ISBN 978-0-19-516779-5 , pp. 278
- Lepore, Jill: Joe Gould's Teeth - The long-lost story of the longest book ever written , The New Yorker, July 27, 2015
- Black World / Negro Digest , Vol. 11, No. 11, Johnson Publishing Company, 1962, p. 50
- Jet , Vol. 48, No. 11, Johnson Publishing Company, June 5, 1975, ISSN 0021-5996, p. 13
Web links
- William Stanley Braithwaite on the archive.org website
- William Stanley Braithwaite on the LibriVox website
- William Stanley Braithwaite on the Project Gutenberg website
- William Stanley Braithwaite on The New York Public Library website
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b William Braithwaite, 83, Dead; A Poet, Anthologist and Critic; Compiled Seventeen Volumes of 'Magazine Verse Won Spingarn Medal in 1918, The New York Times, June 9, 1962, p. 25
- ↑ Bartleby.com - William Stanley Braithwaite
- ↑ NAACP - Spingarn Medal Winners: 1915 To Today ( Memento from May 5, 2014 on WebCite )
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Braithwaite, William Stanley |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Braithwaite, William Stanley Beaumont (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American poet, anthologist, and literary critic |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 6, 1878 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Boston , Massachusetts |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 8, 1962 |
| Place of death | New York City |