Historical Society
Read Kansas!
M-33
By the Kansas Historical Society
Why is Langston Hughes a Notable Kansan?
1
2
I sort of claim to be a Kansan because
my whole childhood was spent here in
Lawrence and Topeka, and sometimes
in Kansas City.
—Langston Hughes
I, Too
3
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Langston Hughes, the “Negro Poet Laureate,”
spent his life advocating for equality and justice.
1. Image credit: Langston Hughes, Library of Congress.
2. Quote credit: “Langston Hughes.” Kansapedia.
Kansas Historical Society. http://www.kshs.
org/15506
3. Poem credit: “I, Too,” from THE COLLECTED POEMS
OF LANGSTON HUGHES by Langston Hughes,
edited by Arnold Rampersad with David Roessel,
Associate Editor, copyright © 1994 by the Estate of
Langston Hughes. Used by permission of Alfred A.
Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc.
Tomorrow,
I’ll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody’ll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen,”
Then.
Besides,
They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—
I, too, am America.
Hughes, a member of the Harlem Renaissance
writers, wrote about the America he knew often
revealing the sadness of poverty and segregation.
4
4. Image credit: Langston Hughes in Harlem 1958 ©
Robert W. Kelley/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.
5. News article credit: “Langston Hughes, Writer, 65,
Dead.” The New York Times on the Web. The New
York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/learning/
general/onthisday/bday/0201.html
Langston Hughes in Harlem, 1958.
BY THE NEW YORK TIMES
5
MAY 23, 1967
Langston Hughes, Writer, 65 Dead
Langston Hughes, the noted writer of novels, stories, poems and plays about Negro life, died
last night in Polyclinic Hospital at the age of 65.
Mr. Hughes was sometimes characterized as the “O. Henry of Harlem.” He was an extremely
versatile and productive author who was particularly well known for his folksy humor.
In a description of himself written for “Twentieth Century Authors,” a biographical dictionary,
Mr. Hughes wrote:
“My chief literary influences have been Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Carl Sandburg and Walt
Whitman. My favorite public figures include Jimmy Durante, Marlene Dietrich, Mary McLeod
Bethune, Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Marian Anderson and Henry Armstrong.”
“I live in Harlem, New York City,” his autobiographical sketch continued. “I am unmarried. I
like ‘Tristan,’ goat’s milk, short novels, lyric poems, heat, simple folk, boats and bullfights; I
dislike, ‘Aida,’ parsnips, long novels, narrative poems, cold, pretentious folk, buses and
bridges”. . .
©2011