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Harlem
Langston Hughes
Langston Hughes (1902–67) has been called the ‘Poet Laureate of the Negro Race’. He is associated with the ‘Harlem Renaissance’ of the early 20th century. When he had earned enough money from his writing he bought a house in Harlem, the black neighbourhood of New York, and lived there the rest of his life. He was born in Joplin, Missouri, and grew up in Kansas, Illinois and Ohio. He came from a poor but noted black family: his great-uncle, a well-known Black American of the 19th century, was a Congressman for Virginia and a founding Dean of the Law School of Howard University. In 1921, Hughes published an excellent poem called ‘The Negro Speaks of Rivers.’ He left home shortly afterwards and attended Columbia University ...
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