From Lyrics Of Love And Laughter By Paul Lawrence Dunbar- (1872-1906) Loves Season When the bees are humming in the honeysuckle vine And the summer days are in their bloom, Then my love is deepest, oh, dearest heart of mine, When the bees are humming in the honeysuckle vine. When the winds are moaning o’er the meadows chill and gray, And the land is dim with winter gloom, Then for thee, my darling, love will have its way, When the winds are moaning o’er the meadows chill and gray. In the vernal dawning with the starting of the leaf, In the merry–chanting time of spring, Love steals all my senses, oh, the happy–hearted thief! In the vernal morning with the starting of the leaf. Always, ever always, even in the autumn drear, When the days are sighing out their grief, Thou art still my darling, dearest of the dear, Always, ever always, even in the autumn drear. I Was Here!... Paul Laurence Dunbar 1872–1906 Paul Laurence Dunbar was one the first influential black poets in American literature. He enjoyed his greatest popularity in the early twentieth century following the publication of dialectic verse in collections such as Majors and Minors and Lyrics of Lowly Life. But the dialectic poems constitute only a small portion of Dunbars canon, which is replete with novels, short stories, essays, and many poems in standard English. In its entirety, Dunbars literary body has been acclaimed as an impressive representation of black life in turn-of-the-century America. As Dunbars friend James Weldon Johnson noted in the preface to his Book of American Poetry: Paul Laurence Dunbar stands out as the first poet from the Negro race in the United States to show a combined mastery over poetic material and poetic technique, to reveal innate literary distinction in what he wrote, and to maintain a high level of performance. He was the first to rise to a height from which he could take a perspective view of his own race. He was the first to see objectively its humor, its superstitions, its short-comings; the first to feel sympathetically its heart-wounds, its yearnings, its aspirations, and to voice them all in a purely literary form. Dunbar began showing literary promise while still in high school in Dayton, Ohio, where he lived with his widowed mother. The only black in his class, he became class president and class poet. By 1889, two years before he graduated, he had already published poems in the Dayton Herald and worked as editor of the short-lived Dayton Tattler, a newspaper for blacks published by classmate Orville Wright, who later gained fame with brother Wilbur Wright as inventors of the airplane. Dunbar aspired to a career in law, but his mothers meager financial situation precluded his university education. He consequently sought immediate employment with various Dayton businesses, including newspapers, only to be rejected because of his race. He finally settled for work as an elevator operator, a job that allowed him time to continue writing. At this time Dunbar produced articles, short stories, and poems, including several in the black-dialect style that later earned him fame. February 14, 2014
Posted on: Sat, 15 Feb 2014 02:55:15 +0000
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