Claude McKay reads "If We Must Die"
Considered one of the founding members of "the New Negro movement" which would later become known as the Harlem Renaissance, Claude McKay reads one of his more frequently anthologized works "If We Must Die". This poem was written in response to the Red Summer of 1919, a harrowing time when anti-black riots broke out in approximately 25 cities across the country resulting in unfair, unjust, and untimely deaths.
PODCAST: Contemporary Poets Discuss Mc Kay's "If We Must Die"
Listen to noted scholars, Herman Beavers, Shalamisha Tillet and Kathy Lou Schultz talk about the structure and circumstances under which "If We Must Die" was written.
PoemTalk is a collaboration of the Kelly Writers House, PennSound, and the Poetry Foundation. It is published as a podcast series in Jacket2 and available for subscription and download in iTunes. In your iTunes store searchbox, type “PoemTalk” and you'll easily find us.
Academic Video Online
Literary Research Databases
Use the following databases to locate literary criticism about writers from the Harlem Renaissance.
- Alexander Street Literature
Is a comprehensive, cross-searchable package of collections covering literatures of place, race, and gender. Today, Alexander Street Literature features 13 collections and offers over 600,000 pages of poetry, short fiction, and novels, along with more than 4,000 full-text plays. With new content being added on a regular basis, the current package currently has over 852,000. Includes: Black Short Fiction and Folklore, Black Women Writers, Caribbean Literature, Irish Women Poets of the Romantic Period, Latin American Women Writers, Latino Literature, Scottish Women Poets of the Romantic Period, and South and Southeast Asian Literature in English.
- Gale Literature
Gale Literature is an integrated research experience that brings together Gale's premier literary databases. This unique digital environment allows researchers of all levels to find a starting point, search across a wide array of materials and points in time, and discover new ways to analyse information. Currently, users can cross-search these collections: Gale Literature Criticism, Gale Literature Resource Center, Gale Literature: LitFinder, Subcollections of Gale eBooks titles, Gale Literature: Dictionary of Literary Biography , Gale Literature: Something About the Author , Gale Literature: Contemporary Authors
- JSTOR
Jstor Is a highly selective digital library of academic content in many formats and disciplines. The collections include top peer-reviewed scholarly journals as well as respected literary journals, academic monographs, research reports from trusted institutes, and primary sources. The library has the entire Arts & Sciences Collection, the Life Sciences Collection and Business Journal IV. We have both archival and current subscriptions. - Oxford African American Studies CenterThe Oxford African American Studies Center combines the authority of carefully edited reference works. It contains: Africana, Encyclopedia of African American History, 1619-1895, Encyclopedia of African American History, 1896 to the Present,Black Women in America, 2nd Edition, African American National Biography, Dictionary of African Biography, The Oxford Encyclopedia of African Thought, and the Dictionary of Caribbean and Afro-Latin American Biography.
Harlem Renaissance Poetry
Select HARLEM RENAISSANCE as the Literary Period to locate over 1000 poems from this time period.
You can also Search by the poet's name (ex. LANGSTON HUGHES)
You can search by keyword (ex. crystal stair) or Poem Title (ex. Negro Speaks of Rivers)
Literature of the Harlem Renaissance
Barracoon: The Story of the Last "Black Cargo"
Location: Browse Books 1st flr - Main
Call No.: E444.L49 H87 2018
“Though both Hurston and Lewis are long gone, Hurston’s account of the former slave’s life serves as a timely reminder of our shared humanity—and the consequences that can occur if we forget it.” --People Magazine
Letters From Langston: From the Harlem Renaissance to the Red Scare and Beyond
Location: ONLINE
"This collection is invaluable. It's Hughes unguarded and off the record, and it's family life on the Left—quietly committed and resilient." --David Levering Lewis, New York University, Pulitzer Prize–winning author
This Waiting for Love: Helene Johnson, Poet of the Harlem Renaissance
Location: Shelf 3rd Flr - Main
Call No.: PS3560.O37834 A6 2000
"Mitchell has performed a great service for students of the Harlem Renaissance with this thoroughly researched collection of Johnson's poems and correspondence." --Hermine Pinson, College of William and Mary)
Harlem Renaissance Writers
Click on a NAME or IMAGE to find library resources about a writer from this time period.
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