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African-American Expatriate Writers

A Home Away

The Oxford Gazette, Score 10580264 (by Ellison, Ralph)
The Souls of Black Folk : Essays and Ske... (by William Edward Burghardt Du Bois)
The Anti-Satisfactionist: Or, The Salvat... (by Richard Wright)
Memorials of Manchester Streets (by Procter, Richard Wright)
Richard III : drame et cinq actes, en pr... (by Séjour, Victor)

Authors present momentous ideas and philosophies to both contemporary and future readers. Early African-American writers realized that while their subject matter correlated directly to other African Americans, their work was far less likely to become included in the anthologies and respected canons of American literature between the 1930s and the 1960s. Expatriate writers, seeking asylum from a world that belittled—or even rejected—their artistic contributions, fled their country to find international publishers, critics, and fellow authors who would recognize the value of their work.

Given the bleak history of American race relations, specifically the time leading up to the Civil Rights Movement, Black writers received little of the interest or praise afforded to white authors. Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man (1952) and a contributor to The Oxford Gazette, traveled Europe to lecture and visit with expatriate friends. He and poet, historian, and critic Robert Penn Warren developed a close friendship in Rome. James Baldwin, the acclaimed author of novels, essays, and plays including Go Tell It On the Mountain (1953), written during his time in Paris, found France a more suitable, tolerant home than America. Richard Wright, another celebrated African-American author, similarly spent much of his life in France. He moved to Paris in 1946, and remained there until his death. In nations like France and Germany, where W.E.B. Du Bois, author of The Souls of Black Folks, attended the University of Berlin for graduate studies, artists were able to continue the work that connected them to their audiences while, escaping the perils that propelled those masterful endeavors. These writers sought to remove themselves from a nation that obstructed their burgeoning talents.

Today, while African-American writers still constitute a small percentage of published works, there have been greater, more concentrated efforts to familiarize readers with works that showcase the immense diversity of writers. Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, August Wilson, and Octavia Butler have demonstrated over the past 30 years that the virtuosity of African-American writers is on par with their more accepted counterparts. The more visibility African-American writers receive, the wider and more encompassing the tradition of American literature becomes.

By Logan Williams