Helene Johnson

Helene Johnson (1906-1995). Courtesy Center for the Humanities, City University of New York.

Helene Johnson
Born	July 7, 1906(1906-Template:MONTHNUMBER-07) Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Died	July 6, 1995(1995-Template:MONTHNUMBER-06) (aged 88) New York, U.S.
Spouse(s)	William Hubbell
Children	Abigail Calachaly Hubbell

Helene Johnson (July 7, 1906 – July 6, 1995) was an African American poet of the Harlem Renaissance.

Life

Born Helen Johnson ("Helene" was a nickname an aunt gave her), Johnson spent her early years at her grandfather’s house in Boston. The rest of her formative years were spent in Brookline, Massachusetts.

Johnson's literary career began when she won 1st prize in a short story competition sponsored by the Boston Chronicle. She also received an honorable mention in a poetry contest organized by Opportunity, the journal of the National Urban League, which was a leading showcase for the talents of African-American artists.

She and her cousin, fiction writer Dorothy West, moved to Harlem in the 1920s. Both were a part of the Harlem Renaissance and became friends with such artists as Zora Neale Hurston. Johnson studied creative writing at Columbia University, but did not graduate.

Johnson reached the height of her popularity in 1927 when her poem "Bottled", a work with unconventional rhythms and innovative slang, was published in the May issue of Vanity Fair.

She married William Hubbel in 1933, and had a child, Abigail.

In 1935, Johnson’s last published poems appeared in Challenge: A literary quarterly.

She spent many years composing poems just for herself, continuing to write a poem a day for the rest of her life, although she no longer submitted them. She died in Manhattan at the age of 89.

Publications

• This Waiting for Love (edited by Verner Mitchell). Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2000.
• "The Boat is Tethered to the Floor": After the Harlem Renaissance. New York: Center for the Humanities, Graduate Center, City University of New York, 2013.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

See also

This Waiting for Love Helene Johnson, Poet of the Harlem Renaissance jpg

• Harlem Renaissance poets
• List of U.S. poets

References

• Shockley, Ann Allen, African-American Women Writers, 1746-1933: An anthology and critical guide. New Haven, CT: Meridian Books.
• Patton, Venetria K. & Maureen Honey, Double Take: A Revisionist Harlem Renaissance Anthology. Rutgers University Press, 2001. ISBN 0-8135-2930-1

External links

Poems

• "Little brown boy"
• "Invocation"

Books

• Helene Johnson at Amazon.com

About

• Helene Johnson, a poet of the Harlem Renaissance at African American Registry.
• Helene Johnson at Voices from the Gaps