First published in 1921 in
The Crisis, the official magazine of the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" became Hughes's signature poem and was collected in his first book of poetry,
The Weary Blues (1926). Hughes's first and last published poems appeared in
The Crisis; more of his poems were published in
The Crisis than in any other journal. Hughes's life and work were enormously influential during the
Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s, alongside those of his contemporaries:
Zora Neale Hurston,
Wallace Thurman,
Claude McKay,
Countee Cullen,
Richard Bruce Nugent, and
Aaron Douglas. Except for McKay, they worked together also to create the short-lived magazine
Fire!! Devoted to Younger Negro Artists. Hughes and his contemporaries had different goals and aspirations than the
black middle class. Hughes and his fellows tried to depict the "low-life" in their art, that is, the real lives of blacks in the lower social-economic strata. They criticized the
divisions and prejudices within the black community based on skin color. Hughes wrote what would be considered their manifesto, "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain", published in
The Nation in 1926: The younger Negro artists who create now intend to express our individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame. If white people are pleased we are glad. If they are not, it doesn't matter. We know we are beautiful. And ugly, too. The
tom-tom cries, and the tom-tom laughs. If colored people are pleased we are glad. If they are not, their displeasure doesn't matter either. We build our temples for tomorrow, strong as we know how, and we stand on top of the mountain free within ourselves. The first time that Hughes Langston mentioned the
Southern U.S in one of his poems was as far back as in June 1922, when, in an issue of "The Crisis", Hughes published a poem called "The South". The poem conveyed how Hughes initially saw the region and its people, describing them as lazy and stupid, thus embracing stereotypes of the time. This perspective was soon to change in a very important and significantly impactful voyage to the South. He was astonished by the way people of color endured racism and their life conditions in the Southern U.S. during his travel. He also had to face racism himself during his visit. During this trip he visited the
Tuskegee Institute alongside Zora, where they met with writer
Jessie Fauset, posing them in a historical photo in front of
Booker T. Washington Sr.'s grave within the campus. During their stay, Langston was specifically asked by the university to write a poem that would be used as an anthem for the institute and as a way to honour Washington's memory. They met various other important figures, such as: the relatives of
Jean Toomer in
Georgia (and visited the plantation that inspired his work known as "
Cane" [1923]). But more importantly, the two met
Bessie Smith in
Macon. The notes that Langston had gathered during his encounter with Bessie and the ones taken beforehand regarding the local folklore helped him in the making of the novel "
Not Without Laughter (1930)" and the play he had written alongside Hurston named "
Mule Bone". This trip also inspired some other of his works, such as "
The Book of Negro Folklore" (which he edited with the help of
Arna Bontemps), "
Montage of Dream Deferred" (where his studies on local folklore came into play). After passing through
South Carolina and crossing the
Mason-Dixon line they both returned to the city of New York. Hughes is quoted as saying. He confronted racial stereotypes, protested social conditions, and expanded African America's image of itself; a "people's poet" who sought to reeducate both audience and artist by lifting the theory of the black aesthetic into reality. Hughes stressed a racial consciousness and
cultural nationalism devoid of self-hate. His thought united people of African descent and Africa across the globe to encourage pride in their diverse black
folk culture and
black aesthetic. Hughes was one of the few prominent black writers to champion racial consciousness as a source of inspiration for black artists. His African-American race consciousness and cultural nationalism would influence many foreign black writers, including
Jacques Roumain,
Nicolás Guillén,
Léopold Sédar Senghor, and
Aimé Césaire. Along with the works of Senghor, Césaire, and other
French-speaking writers of Africa and of African descent from the Caribbean, such as
René Maran from
Martinique and
Léon Damas from
French Guiana in South America, the works of Hughes helped to inspire the
Négritude movement in France. A radical black self-examination was emphasized in the face of
European colonialism. In addition to his example in social attitudes, Hughes had an important technical influence by his emphasis on folk and jazz rhythms as the basis of his poetry of racial pride. In 1930, his first novel,
Not Without Laughter, won the
Harmon Gold Medal for literature. At a time before widespread arts grants, Hughes gained the support of private patrons and he was supported for two years prior to publishing this novel. The protagonist of the story is a boy named Sandy, whose family must deal with a variety of struggles due to their race and class, in addition to relating to one another. In 1931, Hughes helped form the "New York Suitcase Theater" with playwright Paul Peters, artist
Jacob Burck, and writer (soon-to-be underground spy)
Whittaker Chambers, an acquaintance from Columbia. In 1932, he was part of a board to produce a Soviet film on "Negro Life" with
Malcolm Cowley,
Floyd Dell, and Chambers. In 1932, Hughes and Ellen Winter wrote a pageant to
Caroline Decker in an attempt to celebrate her work with the striking coal miners of the
Harlan County War, but it was never performed. It was judged to be a "long, artificial propaganda vehicle too complicated and too cumbersome to be performed."
Maxim Lieber became his literary agent, 1933–1945 and 1949–1950. (Chambers and Lieber worked in the underground together around 1934–1935.) '', Hughes's first short story collection Hughes's first collection of short stories was published in 1934 with
The Ways of White Folks. He finished the book at "Ennesfree" a
Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, cottage provided for a year by Noel Sullivan, another patron since 1933. These stories are a series of vignettes revealing the humorous and tragic interactions between whites and blacks. Overall, they are marked by a general pessimism about race relations, as well as a sardonic realism. In Chicago, Hughes founded
The Skyloft Players in 1941, which sought to nurture black playwrights and offer theatre "from the black perspective." Soon thereafter, he was hired to write a column for the
Chicago Defender, in which he presented some of his "most powerful and relevant work", giving voice to black people. The column ran for twenty years. Hughes also mentored writer
Richard Durham who would later produce a sequence about Hughes in the radio series
Destination Freedom. In 1943, Hughes began publishing stories about a character he called Jesse B. Semple, often referred to and spelled "Simple", the everyday black man in Harlem who offered musings on topical issues of the day. In 1949, alongside Anna Bontempts he edited the anthology of "
The Poetry of the Negro 1746-1949", which was hailed as the "most comprehensive and valuable collection of its kind". He found some new writers, among them
James Baldwin, lacking in such pride, over-intellectual in their work, and occasionally vulgar. Hughes wanted young black writers to be objective about their race, but not to scorn it or flee it. Hughes continued to have admirers among the larger younger generation of black writers. He often helped writers by offering advice and introducing them to other influential persons in the literature and publishing communities. This latter group, including
Alice Walker, whom Hughes discovered, looked upon Hughes as a hero and an example to be emulated within their own work. One of these young black writers (
Loften Mitchell) observed of Hughes: Langston set a tone, a standard of brotherhood and friendship and cooperation, for all of us to follow. You never got from him, 'I am
the Negro writer,' but only 'I am
a Negro writer.' He never stopped thinking about the rest of us. == Political views ==