Angela Jackson
Angela Jackson (born July 25, 1951) is an American poet, playwright, and novelist based in Chicago, Illinois.[1] Jackson became the fifth Illinois Poet Laureate in 2020.[2]
Angela Jackson | |
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Born | Greenville, Mississippi, U.S. | July 25, 1951
Education | |
Occupations |
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Biography
Angela Jackson was born in Greenville, Mississippi, the fifth of nine children,[3] but grew up in the Englewood neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, where her father, George Jackson, Sr., and mother, Angeline Robinson Jackson, moved during the Great Migration.[3][4][5]
Jackson lives and works in Chicago, Illinois.[6]
Education
Jackson attended Catholic elementary school.[5] She graduated third in her high school class at Loretto Academy.[5]
In 1977, she graduated from Northwestern University, where she won an Academy of American Poets Award, and the University of Chicago with an M.A. in Latin American and Caribbean studies.[3] Her novels Where I Must Go and Roads, Where There Are No Roads were inspired by her experiences at Northwestern.
Career
She was a member of the Organization of Black American Culture (OBAC) with young black writers such as Haki Madhubuti (Don L. Lee), Carolyn Rodgers, Sterling Plumpp,[7] and was editor of the journal Nommo.[8]
Awards
- 1973: Conrad Kent Rivers Memorial Award
- 1974: Academy of American Poets Award from Northwestern University
- 1979: Illinois Art Council Creative Writing Fellowship in Fiction
- 1980: National Endowment For the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship in Fiction
- 1984: Hoyt W. Fuller Award for Literary Excellence
- 1985: American Book Award[10]
- 1984: DuSable Museum Writers Seminar Poetry Prize
- 1984: Pushcart Prize for Poetry
- 1989: ETA Gala Award
- 1996: Illinois Authors Literary Heritage Award
- Illinois Arts Council Literary Awards
- five for fiction and one for poetry; The Carl Sandburg Award
- Chicago Sun-Times Friends of Literature Book of the Year Award
- 2000: Illinois Art Council Creative Writing Fellowship in Playwriting
- 2002: Shelley Memorial Award of the Poetry Society of America[11]
- 2008: American Book Award[10]
- 2022: Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize winner[12][13]
Works
Poetry
- "VooDoo/Love Magic", Poetry Foundation
- Voodoo Love Magic. Third World Press. 1974.
- The Greenville Club, 1977 (chapbook)
- Solo in the Boxcar Third Floor E. Oba House. 1985. ISBN 978-0-933653-01-6.
- The Man with the White Liver. Illustrator Melora Walters. Contact II Publications. 1987. ISBN 978-0-936556-16-1.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: others (link) - Dark Legs and Silk Kisses: The Beatitudes of the Spinners. Northwestern University Press. 1993. ISBN 978-0-8101-5001-0.
- And All These Roads Be Luminous: Poems New and Selected. Northwestern University Press. 1997. ISBN 978-0-8101-5076-8.
Plays
- Witness!, 1970
- Shango Diaspora: An African American Myth of Womanhood and Love, 1980
- Comfort Stew. Northwestern University Press. 1984. ISBN 978-0-8101-4117-9. Archived from the original on September 30, 2020. Retrieved December 12, 2020. Also known as When the Wind Blows
- Lightfoot: The Crystal Stair
Novels
- Treemont Stone
- Where I Must Go. Northwestern University Press. 2009. ISBN 978-0-8101-5185-7. Archived from the original on November 25, 2020. Retrieved December 12, 2020. American Book Award
- Roads, Where There Are No Roads. Northwestern University Press. 2017. ISBN 978-0-8101-3472-0. Archived from the original on January 21, 2021. Retrieved December 12, 2020.
Memoir
- Apprenticeship in the House of Cowrie Shells
Anthologies
- Pamela Gemin; Paula Sergi, eds. (1999). Boomer Girls: poems by women from the baby boom generation. University of Iowa Press. ISBN 978-0-87745-687-2.
- Kalamu ya Salaam, ed. (1998). 360,̊ a revolution of Black poets. Black Words. ISBN 978-0-7394-1585-6.
References
- "Angela Jackson". Mississippi Writers and Musicians. February 4, 2008. Archived from the original on October 10, 2008. Retrieved June 30, 2009.
- "Angela Jackson to Serve as Fifth Illinois Poet Laureate". www2.illinois.gov. State of Illinois. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
- "Angela Jackson". Poetry Foundation. April 29, 2023. Retrieved April 29, 2023.
- "Angela Jackson named new Illinois poet laureate: 'I want to awaken the poets'". Chicago Sun-Times. November 26, 2020. Retrieved April 29, 2023.
- Gibbs, Adrienne Samuels (2009). "Full of Grace". Northwestern Magazine. Retrieved September 16, 2023.
- William L. Andrews; Frances Smith Foster; Trudier Harris, eds. (2001). The Concise Oxford Companion to African American Literature. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-513883-2.
- Richard Friedman; Peter Kostakis; Darlene Pearlstein, eds. (1976). 15 Chicago Poets. Yellow Press. ISBN 978-0-916328-04-7.
- "Perspectives: The Eighth Conrad Kent Rivers Memorial Fund". Black World/Negro Digest. Johnson Publishing Company. July 1973. p. 49. Retrieved April 29, 2023.
- Duriga, Joyce. "Catholic faith a touchstone for Illinois poet laureate". Chicago Catholic. Retrieved April 7, 2021.
- American Booksellers Association (2013). "The American Book Awards / Before Columbus Foundation [1980–2012]". BookWeb. Archived from the original on March 13, 2013. Retrieved September 25, 2013.
1985 ... Solo in the Box Car, Third Floor E ... 2008 ... Where I Must Go: A Novel (TriQuarterly)
- "Poetry Society of America Awards for 2002". Poetry Society of America. July 27, 2004. Archived from the original on June 16, 2002.
- "Poet Laureate Angela Jackson – IL Humanities". www.ilhumanities.org. Retrieved September 16, 2023.
- Foundation, Poetry (September 16, 2023). "Iconic Writers Honored at the Poetry Foundation's 2022 Pegasus Awards". Poetry Foundation. Retrieved September 16, 2023.
External links
- Angela Jackson Bio from Illinois Poet Laureate
- Nora Brooks Blakely (August 1985). "Word Wizard". Ebony Jr. Magazine.