I lived from 1888-1958.
I was from the USA, and am in the Americas category.
I was influenced by poet Carl Sandburg.
Fenton Johnson was born on May 7, 1888 in Chicago, Illinois to parents Elijah and Jesse (Taylor) Johnson. His father was a railroad porter, and one of the wealthiest African Americans in Chicago. The midwest had a great influence on his writing. He was poet, essayist, author of short stories, editor, and educator. His works foreshadowed the Harlem Renaissance. Johnson once said that he "scribbled poetry since the age of nine". Mr. Johnson initally had his heart set on the clergy. Johnson attended public school and college in Chicago, and later went on to Northwestern University and Columbia University's journalism school. He taught briefly at the state University in Louiseville, Kentucky. After marrying his wife Cecilia Rhone, he spent the majority of his artisitic years in Chicago and New York.
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Johnson produced three books of poetry, "A Little Dreaming" in 1913, "Visions of the Dark" in 1915, and in 1916 he published "Songs of the Soul". All three books received critical acclaim, and were funded by Mr. Johnson himself. It is often noted that he was very flavorful in the 'old dialect' style much like the renderings of Paul Laurence Dunbar. Johnson’s poetry was at first of the conventional nature. He then turned to free form writing in which the irregular and unrhymed lines, and the rhythms were determined by the theme. He used free form, splendid imagery, and actual Black venacular rather than romanticism. He portrayed the chaotic world of the black man caught up in a world that judged harshly because of skin tones. Racism was often a deliberate subject for his works. Mr. Johnson did not limit himself to poetry. He was a lover of the written word, and published a collection of short stories etitled; "Tales of Darkest America", and a book of essays; "For the Highest Good", both in 1920. He founded and edited a literary magazine, and wrote several plays. By the age of nineteen he had seen some of his plays on various stages in Chicago, but the most noted production was "The Cabaret Girl" which premiered at the old Pekin Theatre in 1921.
Fenton Johnson exhibited a marked intellectual acuity of racial consciousness in all his writings, and more than foreshadowed the Harlem Renaissance. In essence this great writer, who often goes unmentioned, gave voice to the Renaissance. He paved the way for major hitters like Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Claude McKay, and countless other literary geniuses of that era. Fenton Johnson was also one of the greatest contributers to the entreprenurial motivation that swept Harlem, New York, and many other midwestern cities in the early 1900's. Johnson is included in the archives of Black American poetry not only because of his poems, but also because his works anticipated the Harlem Renaissance, and lent themselves to an monumental upevil in the literary arts by African Americans. Mr. Johnson passed away in 1958 at the age of 70.
Biblography:-
The Oxford Champion to African American Literature,
Masterpieces of African American Literature,
Africana -The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience
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