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Angela Jackson

アンジェラ・ジャクソン

Anjera Jakkuson

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1951-07-25 （Greenville, Mississippi, U.S.）
Nationality
United States
Languages
English
Religion
Catholicism
Residence History
Greenville, Mississippi (birthplace) → Chicago, Illinois (Englewood neighborhood)

Career

Occupations
poet, playwright, novelist, educator
Active Years
1970-
Affiliations
Organization of Black American Culture (OBAC), Kennedy-King College (faculty), Columbia College Chicago (faculty), Framingham State University (faculty), Howard University (faculty)
Memberships
Organization of Black American Culture (OBAC)
Influenced By
Mari Evans, Hoyt W. Fuller, Haki Madhubuti (Don L. Lee), Carolyn Rodgers, Sterling D. Plumpp

Education

Northwestern University
English and American Literature
Degree: BA
Period: 1970s
Year of Graduation: 1977
Country: United States
Published first poetry book Voodoo Love Magic as an undergraduate; won a Northwestern poetry prize.
University of Chicago
Latin American and Caribbean Studies
Degree: MA
Period: 1990s
Year of Graduation: 1995
Country: United States
Completed MA in Latin American and Caribbean Studies.

Awards

Conrad Kent Rivers Memorial Award
1973
Organization: Conrad Kent Rivers Memorial Fund
Result: 受賞
Academy of American Poets Award (Northwestern University)
1974
Organization: Academy of American Poets / Northwestern University
Result: 受賞
Illinois Arts Council Creative Writing Fellowship (Fiction)
1979
Category: フェローシップ
Organization: Illinois Arts Council
Result: 受賞
National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship (Fiction)
1980
Category: フェローシップ
Organization: National Endowment for the Arts
Result: 受賞
Hoyt W. Fuller Award for Literary Excellence
1984
Organization: Hoyt W. Fuller Award
Result: 受賞
Pushcart Prize (Poetry)
1984
Category: 詩
Organization: Pushcart Press
Result: 受賞
American Book Award
1985
Organization: Before Columbus Foundation
Result: 受賞
Shelley Memorial Award
2002
Organization: Poetry Society of America
Result: 受賞
John Gardner Fiction Prize
2018
Category: 小説
Result: 受賞
Poet Laureate of Illinois
2020
Category: 任命
Organization: State of Illinois
Result: 任命
Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize
2022
Organization: Poetry Foundation
Result: 受賞
American Book Award (again)
2008
Organization: Before Columbus Foundation
Result: 受賞

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

Voodoo Love Magic

1974 Poetry

Her first poetry collection, combining personal and cultural roots with urban experience.

rootsurban lifeidentity

More Than Meat and Raiment

2022 Poetry

A recent landmark collection blending race, history, and personal memory in mature poems.

racememoryhistory

Treemont Stone

1984 Novel

A novel from the 1980s set in urban communities.

communityurban life

Apprenticeship in the House of Cowrie Shells

Memoir

A memoir reflecting on upbringing and development as a writer.

upbringingformation as a writer

Bibliography

  • Voodoo Love Magic (1974)
  • The Greenville Club (1977)
  • Solo in the Boxcar Third Floor (1985)
  • The Man with the White Liver (1987)
  • Dark Legs and Silk Kisses: The Beatitudes of the Spinners (1993)
  • And All These Roads Be Luminous: Poems New and Selected (1997)
  • It Seems Like a Mighty Long Time (2015)
  • More Than Meat and Raiment (2022)
  • Treemont Stone (novel, 1984)
  • Where I Must Go (novel, 2009)
  • Roads, Where There Are No Roads (novel, 2017)
  • Apprenticeship in the House of Cowrie Shells (memoir)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
incorporation of conversational rhythms and blues inflectionsdensely metaphorical and symbolic verses
Recurring Motifs
resistance to racial injusticemigration and the Great Migrationfamily and communityreligion and faith

Legacy

Angela Jackson is acclaimed for poems that incisively address race and urban realities. She has been appointed Illinois Poet Laureate and won major awards including the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. Her work, often infused with blues and conversational rhythms, is celebrated as a rooted community voice.

Academic Societies

  • Chicago literary organizations (including halls of fame)

Archives

  • Poetry Foundation archives
  • Materials referenced in SNAC/WorldCat authority databases

Quotes

  • Her lines bristle with the melody of conversation and soulful blues.
    Source: Kevin Stein (previous Illinois Poet Laureate), statement announcing 2020 appointment (2020)
  • When discussing racial inequities, she writes with 'a tender radiance.'
    Source: Donna Seaman, review in TriQuarterly (2015)

Trivia

  • Originally intended to study pre-med at Northwestern before switching to writing.
  • Member of the Organization of Black American Culture (OBAC) since 1970 and served as its coordinator from 1976 to 1990.
  • Appointed Illinois Poet Laureate in 2020.
  • Received the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize in 2022.