answersLogoWhite

0

Maya Angelou

Born on April 4, 1928, Maya Angelou is known as an autobiographer, poet, playwright, director, producer, performance artist, educator, and winner of the Horatio Alger Award. Most well known as the author of the autobiography, "I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings", she has been nominated for many book awards and was a symbol of pluck and pride for African-American women.

500 Questions

Did Maya angelou write any poetic sonnets?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

I believe she wrote a poem titled "Africa," which is one you are most likely inquiring about.

'why would laurie halse Anderson choose poster of Maya Angelou for melinda in speak'?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

Because Melinda's 9th grade year really parallels Maya Angelou's childhood.

Maya Angelou, like Melinda in the story, was also raped as a young girl. After Melinda told of the rape (a friend of her father's) he was beaten to death....and because of this Maya became afraid to speak. She remained a mute for five years, till a teacher of hers got her to start talking again by introducing her to literature, and begin writing.

Just like Melinda was raped, became a mute, and was brought out of her shell by her art teacher.

Why did Maya Angelou get the presidential medal of freedom?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

maya angelou was given the president medal of arts in 2000

Rhyme scheme for Alone by Maya Angelou?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

a

b

c

b

d

e

f

e

g

h

i

b

j

b

k

b

d

l

m

l

n

b

o

b

d

b

p

b

q

b

r

b

s

s

t

b

t

b

u

u

b

b

b

What is the mood of caged bird by Maya Angelou?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

A free bird leaps

on the back of the wind

and floats downstream

till the current ends

and dips his wing

in the orange sun rays

and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks

down his narrow cage

can seldom see through

his bars of rage

his wings are clipped and

his feet are tied

so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings

with a fearful trill

of things unknown

but longed for still

and his tune is heard

on the distant hill

for the caged bird

sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze

and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees

and the fat worms waiting on a dawn bright lawn

and he names the sky his own

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams

his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream

his wings are clipped and his feet are tied

so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings

with a fearful trill

of things unknown

but longed for still

and his tune is heard

on the distant hill

for the caged bird

sings of freedom.

Why did the Maya build monuments like this?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

because they felt like it

How did Angelou overcome her obstacles?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

She keep on trying and overcome her obstacles, stayed strong and healthy, and fight for her good life.

Men by Maya Angelou Summary?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

A women in her daily life have to work very much,she have many responsibilities with her family,so for their welfare she have to forget about her happiness and interests.as a women she also have many duties like caring of children at that same time repair the clothes,clean the floor,take food to shop,fry the chicken,to dry the baby,to feed the family members,to clear the garden,to press the shirts,to dress the children,to cut the cane,to clean up the hut,to care the people who are sick,to pick the cotton etc.to perform the list of these responsibilities she have to work hard and so she get rid from the common family entertainment ,hence nothing entertain her and get isolated from family happiness.beside of the works the beauty of nature like sunshine and rain always purify her,they give such a feeling that she get energy to do work,and only the nature is there to console her,to encourage her.when dew drops fall gently and cool her brows she feel that it consoles her.but she want to rescue from this busy world and so she pleads the storm that with its strongest wind escape her from these burdens and let her float across the sky till these burdens get rid from her.she pray for death however rest tonight and wish to cover her with gently falling snowflakes which feel like a white cold icy kisses.she consider sun,rain,curving sky,mountain,oceans,leaf and stone and also star shine,moon glow etc.as her own since they always stay with her and which console and make joy with her.

What was Maya angelous education?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

yes she dropped out of high school in 1942 but then attended George Washington high school in 1943 finished and then studied dance and drama on a scholarship at the California labor school she did not attend college.

Where has Maya Angelou lived?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

Maya Angelou Date of birth: April 4, 1928

Print Biography

Maya Angelou was born Marguerite Annie Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri. Her parents divorced when she was only three and she was sent with her younger brother Bailey to live with their grandmother in the small town of Stamps, Arkansas. In Stamps, the young girl experienced the racial discrimination that was the legally enforced way of life in the American South, but she also absorbed the deep religious faith and old-fashioned courtesy of traditional African American life. She credits her grandmother and her extended family with instilling in her the values that informed her later life and career. She enjoyed a close relationship with her younger brother. Unable to pronounce her name because of a stutter, Bailey called her "My" for "My sister." A few years later, when he read a book about the Maya Indians, he began to call her "Maya," and the name stuck.

At age seven, while visiting her mother in Chicago, she was sexually molested by her mother's boyfriend. Too ashamed to tell any of the adults in her life, she confided in her brother. When she later heard the news that an uncle had killed her attacker, she felt that her words had killed the man. She fell silent and did not speak for five years.

Maya began to speak again at 13, when she and her brother rejoined their mother in San Francisco. Maya attended Mission High School and won a scholarship to study dance and drama at San Francisco's Labor School, where she was exposed to the progressive ideals that animated her later political activism. She dropped out of school in her teens to become San Francisco's first African American female cable car conductor. She later returned to high school, but became pregnant in her senior year and graduated a few weeks before giving birth to her son, Guy. She left home at 16 and took on the difficult life of a single mother, supporting herself and her son by working as a waitress and cook, but she had not given up on her talents for music, dance, performance and poetry.

In 1952, she married a Greek sailor named Anastasios Angelopulos. When she began her career as a nightclub singer, she took the professional name Maya Angelou, combining her childhood nickname with a form of her husband's name. Although the marriage did not last, her performing career flourished. She toured Europe with a production of the opera Porgy and Bess in 1954 and 1955. She studied modern dance with Martha Graham, danced with Alvin Ailey on television variety shows and recorded her first record album, Calypso Lady (1957).

She had composed song lyrics and poems for many years, and by the end of the 1950s was increasingly interested in developing her skills as a writer. She moved to New York, where she joined the Harlem Writers Guild and took her place among the growing number of young black writers and artists associated with the Civil Rights Movement. She acted in the historic Off-Broadway production of Jean Genet's The Blacks and wrote and performed a Cabaret for Freedom with the actor and comedian Godfrey Cambridge.

In New York, she fell in love with the South African civil rights activist Vusumzi Make and in 1960, the couple moved, with Angelou's son, to Cairo, Egypt. In Cairo, Angelou served as editor of the English language weekly The Arab Observer. Angelou and Guy later moved to Ghana, where she joined a thriving group of African American expatriates. She served as an instructor and assistant administrator at the University of Ghana's School of Music and Drama, worked as feature editor for The African Review and wrote for The Ghanaian Times and the Ghanaian Broadcasting Company.

During her years abroad, she read and studied voraciously, mastering French, Spanish, Italian, Arabic and the West African language Fanti. She met with the American dissident leader Malcolm X in his visits to Ghana, and corresponded with him as his thinking evolved from the racially polarized thinking of his youth to the more inclusive vision of his maturity.

Maya Angelou returned to America in 1964, with the intention of helping Malcolm X build his new Organization of African American Unity. Shortly after her arrival in the United States, Malcolm X was assassinated, and his plans for a new organization died with him. Angelou involved herself in television production and remained active in the Civil Rights Movement, working more closely with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who requested that Angelou serve as Northern Coordinator for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. His assassination, falling on her birthday in 1968, left her devastated. With the guidance of her friend, the novelist James Baldwin, she found solace in writing, and began work on the book that would become I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. The book tells the story of her life from her childhood in Arkansas to the birth of her child. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings was published in 1970 to widespread critical acclaim and enormous popular success.

Seemingly overnight, Angelou became a national figure. In the following years, books of her verse and the subsequent volumes of her autobiographical narrative won her a huge international audience. She was increasingly in demand as a teacher and lecturer and continued to explore dramatic forms as well. She wrote the screenplay and composed the score for the film Georgia, Georgia (1972). Her screenplay, the first by an African American woman ever to be filmed, was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.

Angelou has been invited by successive Presidents of the United States to serve in various capacities. President Ford appointed her to the American Revolution Bicentennial Commission and President Carter invited her to serve on the Presidential Commission for the International Year of the Woman. President Clinton requested that she compose a poem to read at his inauguration in 1993. Angelou's reading of her poem "On the Pulse of the Morning" was broadcast live around the world.

Since 1981, Angelou has served as Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She has continued to appear on television and in films including Poetic Justice (1993) and the landmark television adaptation of Roots (1977). She has directed numerous dramatic and documentary programs on television and directed her first feature film, Down in the Delta, in 1996.

The list of her published works now includes more than 30 titles. These include numerous volumes of verse, beginning with Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'Fore I Die (1971). Books of her stories and essays include Wouldn't Take Nothing For My Journey Now (1993) and Even the Stars Look Lonesome(1997). She has continued the compelling narrative of her life in the books Gather Together in My Name (1974), Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas (1976), The Heart of a Woman (1981), All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes (1987) and A Song Flung Up to Heaven (2002).

In 1991, 1994 and 1997, Maya Angelou participated in a series of live broadcasts for Achievement Television in which she took questions submitted by students from across the United States. The interview with Maya Angelou on this web site has been condensed from these broadcasts.

What is the birth name of Maya Booth?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

Maya Booth's birth name is Maya Emma Booth.

What is the name of Maya diab husband?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

Abbas Naser

What facts about Maya Angelou?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

She was sexually assaulted at the age of 8, she began speaking again at the age of 12

in 1944 she droppd out of high school.

She got pregnant at the age of 16 and named him Guy.

She married Tosh Angelos.

She worked at many different jobs.

She thought she would never amount to anything.

She also was a prostitute.

She had a drug addition

In 1978 she wrote her famous poem "And Still I Rise".

Why was Maya successful?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

fishing

How did Maya Angelou's childhood experiences effect her achievements?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

She was sexually molested as a child by her mother's boyfriend. She became mute to anyone but her brother for over five years.

How do you dress like Maya Angelou?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

i think you shoould wear something african like a scarf and long cloth etc. od you can go more american and wear a skirt suit because she wears that at times also i have to do a project and i have to dress up like her so yeah i would go with the skirt suit but its up to you and dont forget the pink llipstick and makup

Is Maya Angelou still writing poetry today?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

I heard she is since she was not able to attend a luncheon yesterday.

Getting a job by Maya angelou summary?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

The story takes place in San Francisco and it is about a girl that is looking for a job she went to many jobs but she got rejected this one job, working in market street railway company, she got rejected because she was black, and because she was a girl, so that made her fight till she got the job. she eventually got the job even though there were other jobs that paid even more and were more easy to get she still wanted to get this specific job she wanted to make a point clear, that id doesn't matter what race you are or what sex you are, what matters is that you know how to do the job.

Which of the Maya achievements are most important?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

Art and architecture, science and math, but also writing and oral traditions.

Why does Angelou decide to seek work as a streetcar conductorette?

User Avatar

Asked by Wiki User

Maybe because it was her dream job back then.

Didn't you ever have a dream of what you wanted to do?