Maya Angelou Accomplishments

One of the most popular poets of all time, Maya Angelou's poetry was powerful and personal because she was not afraid to cross the lines of race and culture. Angelou once said, “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Her works expressed her spirit for the cause of liberation, diversity, and empowerment for people everywhere. Trials and errors that occurred in her childhood and adulthood affected the way she wrote and what she wrote about. Maya Angelou was not only a writer, she was a strong voice for freedom and equality. There was no end to her good will. Angelou opposed racism, economic injustice, poverty, and all violations of human rights.
She will forever reign as a literary revolution who fought every battle with her pen.
Marguerite Annie Johnson was born on April 4, 1928, in St.Louis Missouri(Collier). After her parents divorced, Bailey and Vivian Johnson, she no longer lived a normal childhood. She lived two separate lives where one was in Arkansas and another was in California. In Stamps, Arkansas she lived with her grandmother, Annie Henderson(Cuffie 14). Angelou described Stamps being a town where blacks and whites lived in completely different communities divided by railroad tracks(Cuffie 14). Because of her parents divorce, Angelou struggled with the feeling of displacement and growing up in the south did not benefit her self-esteem. Angelou recalls having a repetitive dream where she was” a too-big Negro girl” then she transformed into” a sweet little white girl”(Cuffie 15). When Maya was eight years old, she was raped by her mother’s boyfriend, Mr.Freeman(Cuffie 19). Mr.Freeman had ordered Bailey out of the house one night when it was late and her mom had not returned from work(Cuffie 19). She was sworn to secrecy, and he only went to jail for a year and one day(Cuffie 19). For a while, Angelou stopped talking, but this tragedy shaped the way she wrote. But that’s not the only incident. On a summer trip to her father's in Los Angeles, she was stabbed by her dad’s girlfriend(Cuffie 24). Her Father’s girlfriend resented Maya from the attention she received from him(Cuffie 24). Maya suddenly lost her temper from the trouble his girlfriend had been giving her and slapped her(Cuffie 24). They both began to fight until Angelou realized that she had been stabbed(Cuffie 24). She ran to her father’s car and locked herself in(Cuffie 24). This was one of Angelou’s most unforgettable moments. Annie Henderson was one of the few good influences on her life. She always taught Maya to believe in God, honest work, and family(Caged Bird Legacy). Annie Henderson owned the “William Johnson General Merchandise Store” which served both whites and blacks(Caged Bird Legacy). They also lived in the store with her brother, Bailey Johnson, and her crippled uncle, Willie. Together, these two gave her unshakable faith that would help her years to come. Angelou’s love for the arts got her a scholarship to her first official education at the George Washington High School in San Francisco to study dance(Collier 8). At fourteen, she dropped out and became San Francisco's first female cable car conductor(Caged Bird Legacy). Later on, she skipped a grade and attended an all-girls school where girls were “faster, meaner, and more prejudiced” than at her other school(Cuffie 23). She finished high school giving birth to her son, Guy, a few weeks after graduation.
Maya Angelou’s adulthood began when she had her first-born child at the age of sixteen. She was determined to raise him. Angelou worked as a shake dancer in nightclubs, a fry cook in hamburger joints, a dinner cook in a creole restaurant, and a job in a mechanic shop(Collier 8). She supported her son by putting her passion for performance, dance, music, and poetry aside but what she didn’t know is that her career would soon take center stage. In 1954 and 1955 Angelou toured twenty-two countries with a production of the opera Porgy and Bess(Collier 8). She studied modern dance with Martha Graham, danced with Alvin Ailey on television variety shows, and in 1957 recorded her first album Calypso Lady(Caged Bird Legacy). In 1957, she returned to New York and appeared in several plays, and she joined the Harlem Writers Guild. Just as she thought her life was beginning to look up, it took a turn for the worse. Angelou was in a relationship with Troubadour Martin, and she begged him to share his “hidden world” with her; heroin(Cuffie 24). As she grew deeper into the addiction and into many different unconscious states, she promised to regain her innocence and moved back to San Francisco. There, she was a singer in San Francisco's Purple Onion cabaret(Collier 8). Maya Angelou spent many years abroad. In Cairo, Egypt she worked as an associate editor for an English language weekly newspaper the Arab Observer(Collier 10). She left Egypt in 1962 for West Africa and describes the experience in All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes. Next, she found a job at the University of Ghana as assistant administrator of music and drama. When Angelou returned to the U.S. in the 1960s, she became a professor, lecturing at the University of California. Angelou wanted to meet Martin Luther King Jr. for years. She had sent many letters, and one day she got the chance to talk to him. She described him of having a “friendliness which was unsettling” look(Cuffie 54). He rid her of her grudge against her brother. Martin Luther King Jr. told her even though he had committed crimes, she should still love him(Cuffie 54). Angelou would remember this significant event forever.
Maya Angelou’s first autobiography was I know Why the Caged Bird Sings(Collier 3).
It tells the story of her childhood growing up in Arkansas, Missouri, and California. This book made the international bestseller list and was banned in many schools for her honesty about being sexually abused(Caged Bird Legacy). She wrote about her accomplishment period and her hope for the future in The Heart of a Woman(Academy of American Poets). One of her most well-known poems, Still I Rise, references to her rough past. In stanza nine, she wrote “nights of terror and fear”. Angelou also involves the use of internal rhyme, and the rhyme scheme is an ABCB pattern. Angelou makes the poem more intriguing by using personification in stanza six. For example, “shoot me with your words”. She compares dust to herself, “but still, like dust, I’ll rise. Almost all of her works speak about her brutal past. She is able to make any reader feel what she wants them to feel. In the poem Phenomenal Woman, she wants the readers to know why she always walks with her head held high(The Complete Collected Poems of Maya Angelou). Angelou explains that a woman does not have to do anything loud to get attention. “Rather it is the sound of her heels, the curve in her hair, the palm of her hand making her a ‘phenomenal woman’”. Angelou had an incredible love for music. She wrote lyrics for B.B. King in the film For Love of Ivy(Caged Bird Legacy). She produced an album title with Nick Ashford and Valerie Simpson’s vocals along with her spoken words. She won three grammy’s for best-spoken word album. Angelou has won multiple awards. She’s received the National book award, Pulitzer prize, Tony Award, Women of the Year in 1976, and so many more(Chavis 2) There was no end to her
achievement.
Maya Angelou was one of the most transformative global leaders and visionaries of our time. She embraced her heritage and culture through her works which allowed readers to see the world through her eyes. Angelou was never too scared to stand up to a challenge. People everywhere were inspired by her beautifully written pieces that could change the human perspective.