Amiri Baraka Summary

Baraka, Amiri (1934—) Writer Amiri Baraka founded the 1960s Black Arts Movement, transforming white, liberal aesthetics into black nationalist poetics and politics. In 1967, he converted to Isl... Read more

Biography EssayAn influential figure among the literary avant-garde of Greenwich Village and the Lower East Side during the late 1950s and early 1960s, Amiri Baraka (known as LeRoi Jones until 1968) h... Read more

LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka is one author who inevitably is mentioned whenever people talk about Afro-American literature. But he is also a writer who figures prominently in the development of contempora... Read more

An influential figure among the literary avant-garde of Greenwich Village and the lower East Side during the late 1950s and early 1950s, Amiri Baraka (known as LeRoi Jones until 1968) has been a semin... Read more

In the following essay, a reprint of the original which appeared in Liberator in 1965, Baraka outlines the goals and responsibilities of Black Revolutionary Theatre. The Revolutionary Theatre shoul... Read more

In this review of "The Toilet, " Hewes finds that while the gratuitous violence and obscenities may scare off many viewers, the play is nonetheless "a vivid and indelible work of ... Read more

Below, Tener claims that "The Toilet" explores the negative affects of white society on the maturing process of black boys. At the time mat Baraka was composing "The Toilet,&#x... Read more

In the following chapter excerpt, Lacey states that race is not a central theme of "The Toilet" and Baraka's involvement with the Beat movement is evident. ["The Toilet&... Read more

Clurman finds "Slave Ship " a masterpiece of living theater. From what I had read about ["Slave Ship"] after its first performance at the Brooklyn Academy of Music I exp... Read more

In the excerpt below, Benston explores Baraka's use of music throughout his work, especially in "Slave Ship. " In his drama Baraka has constantly used music. In "Jello,&... Read more

In the following interview with Sandra G. Shannon, Baraka explores his own vision as director of his dramas. [Shannon]: The questions that I'd like to ask you today are specifically oriented... Read more

In the following excerpt, Oliver praises the "deadly wit and passionate wild comedy " of "Dutchman, " but felt that the anger expressed by the black character, while justif... Read more

In the following article, Reck examines archetypal symbolism in "Dutchman," and argues that Baraka's play pities the white world, leaving Lula stuck in it and setting Clay free th... Read more

In the following excerpt, Keyssar argues that Baraka has portrayed the main characters of "Dutchman" realistically, not just symbolically, thereby intensifying their effect on the audien... Read more

In the following excerpt from her Staging Masculinity, McDonough studies Baraka's treatment of black manhood in his works. While [Eugene] O'Neill, [Arthur] Miller, and [Tennessee] Wil... Read more

In the following interview, conducted in 1982 by D. H. Melhem and Michael Bezdek, Baraka discusses a variety of topics including his upbringing, his work, and his views on art and politics. Since t... Read more

In the following interview, Baraka discusses his work as a director and his views on directing. Amiri Baraks is an artist of the 1960s' political scene still hard at work in the 1980s. Playw... Read more

In the following review, Wallenstein provides a positive assessment of Transbluency. Deeply political, Amiri Baraka writes poems that have bothered many, reflecting as they do his dream of revoluti... Read more

In the following essay, Piggford explores Baraka's psychological analysis of black American men in Dutchman. Houston A. Baker, Jr. has rightly observed [in The Journey Back: Issues in Black ... Read more

Critical Essay by M. L. Rosenthal [Baraka's] poems and plays have explored the subjective effects of the dominant whites' violation of black mentality, and at the same time have acted o... Read more

Critical Essay by Carll Tucker Maybe humanism is not an adequate stand from which to review Amiri Baraka's political diatribe "S-1." Maybe devotion to a just perspective, tempera... Read more

Critical Essay by P. J. Laska Hard Facts is a self-consciously communist poetry book, right down to the red cover with the silhouettes of Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin-Mao on the back. Baraka's con... Read more

Critical Essay by C.w.e. Bigsby The fear which pervades LeRoi Jones's work is that of a loss of identity—a fear which becomes socially relevant when extended to the scale of racial assi... Read more

Critical Essay by James Robert Payne The inclusion of the 1967 work Slave Ship alongside the recent The Motion of History (1976) and S-I (1976) in [The Motion of History and Other Plays] reveals Bara... Read more