Amiri Baraka

Who Was Amiri Baraka?

Amiri Baraka — born Everett LeRoi Jones in Newark, New Jersey — was one of the most provocative, prolific, and politically engaged figures in twentieth-century American literature. Educated at Howard University and Columbia, he emerged in the late 1950s as a central figure in the Beat movement, publishing in the same circles as Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. His early work — collected in Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note (1961) — showed a lyrical, introspective sensibility that his later political radicalization would largely displace.

The assassination of Malcolm X in 1965 marked a decisive turn. Baraka left his white wife, moved to Harlem, founded the Black Arts Repertory Theatre/School, and became the central figure of the Black Arts Movement — the cultural arm of Black Power, dedicated to the creation of a distinctly Black aesthetic that would serve the political liberation of Black people. His play Dutchman (1964), written just before this turn, remains his most performed and most studied work: a brutal, allegorical encounter on a New York subway that ends in murder.

His critical work Blues People (1963) is still considered one of the foundational texts of African American music criticism. He was named Poet Laureate of New Jersey in 2002, a position from which he was effectively removed after controversy over a poem about the September 11 attacks. He remained a figure of fierce controversy until his death in 2014.

In Their Own Words

Selected Bibliography

• Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note — 1961 — poetry
• Blues People — 1963 — music criticism
• Dutchman — 1964 — play, Obie Award
• The Dead Lecturer — 1964 — poetry
• Black Music — 1967 — criticism