Langston Hughes

Langston Hughes (February 1, 1902 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, novelist, playwright, and newspaper columnist.

Early life

He was born James Mercer Langston Hughes in Joplin, Missouri, the son of Carrie Langston Hughes, a black teacher, and her husband, a white lawyer named James Nathaniel Hughes, making him what was then called a mulatto, a racial makeup would have great influence on his life and work. After their divorce, young Langston was raised mainly by his grandmother Mary Langston, a longtime activist http://www.phatliterature.com/schedule/spotlight/langston-hughes-library.shtml. He spent most of childhood in Lawrence, Kansas He began to write poetry when he was 13.

Related Topics:
Joplin, Missouri - Black - White - Mulatto - Lawrence, Kansas

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His childhood was not a very happy one, but it was one that was to heavily influence the poet he was to become. He lived with his by-then-remarried mother as an adolescent in Lincoln, Illinois; it was there that he discovered his love of books. Upon graduating from high school in 1919, Hughes spent a year in Mexico with his father, but he was unhappy there and often contemplated suicide.

Related Topics:
Lincoln, Illinois - 1919 - Mexico - Suicide

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Hughes soon spent a year attending Columbia University, where he studied engineering. He then left school and joined the Navy as a ship's steward, traveling to West and Central Africa and Europe.

Related Topics:
Columbia University - Engineering - Navy - West - Central Africa - Europe

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