Movement in Black
Author: Pat Parker
Pat Parker -- that revolutionary, raw and as they used to say, "right-on sister" -- would be celebrating her fifty-fifth birthday in 1999 had she not died of breast cancer ten years ago. To honor her work and call attention to the significance of her contributions, Firebrand Books is publishing a new, expanded edition of her classic, Movement In Black.
With an incisive introduction by Cheryl Clarke, celebrations/ remembrances/tributes from ten outstanding African American women writers, and a dozen previously unpublished pieces, Movement In Black is a must read/ must have on your book shelf.
Whether she was presenting her poetry on street corners, performing with other women -- writers, musicians, activists -- in bars and auditoriums, rallying the crowd at political events, preaching to the converted, or converting the ill-informed, Pat Parker was a presence.
She wrote about gut issues: the lives of ordinary Black people, violence, loving women, the legacy of her African American heritage, being queer. She was a woman who engaged life fully, both personally and as a political activist, linking the struggles for racial, gender, sexual, and class equality long before it was "PC" to do so. She died as she lived -- fighting forces larger than herself.
The publication of Movement In Black is an opportunity, both for those who were around the first time and those who are new to her work, to experience and enjoy Pat Parker's power.
Author: Pat Parker
Pat Parker -- that revolutionary, raw and as they used to say, "right-on sister" -- would be celebrating her fifty-fifth birthday in 1999 had she not died of breast cancer ten years ago. To honor her work and call attention to the significance of her contributions, Firebrand Books is publishing a new, expanded edition of her classic, Movement In Black.
With an incisive introduction by Cheryl Clarke, celebrations/ remembrances/tributes from ten outstanding African American women writers, and a dozen previously unpublished pieces, Movement In Black is a must read/ must have on your book shelf.
Whether she was presenting her poetry on street corners, performing with other women -- writers, musicians, activists -- in bars and auditoriums, rallying the crowd at political events, preaching to the converted, or converting the ill-informed, Pat Parker was a presence.
She wrote about gut issues: the lives of ordinary Black people, violence, loving women, the legacy of her African American heritage, being queer. She was a woman who engaged life fully, both personally and as a political activist, linking the struggles for racial, gender, sexual, and class equality long before it was "PC" to do so. She died as she lived -- fighting forces larger than herself.
The publication of Movement In Black is an opportunity, both for those who were around the first time and those who are new to her work, to experience and enjoy Pat Parker's power.
Author: Pat Parker
Pat Parker -- that revolutionary, raw and as they used to say, "right-on sister" -- would be celebrating her fifty-fifth birthday in 1999 had she not died of breast cancer ten years ago. To honor her work and call attention to the significance of her contributions, Firebrand Books is publishing a new, expanded edition of her classic, Movement In Black.
With an incisive introduction by Cheryl Clarke, celebrations/ remembrances/tributes from ten outstanding African American women writers, and a dozen previously unpublished pieces, Movement In Black is a must read/ must have on your book shelf.
Whether she was presenting her poetry on street corners, performing with other women -- writers, musicians, activists -- in bars and auditoriums, rallying the crowd at political events, preaching to the converted, or converting the ill-informed, Pat Parker was a presence.
She wrote about gut issues: the lives of ordinary Black people, violence, loving women, the legacy of her African American heritage, being queer. She was a woman who engaged life fully, both personally and as a political activist, linking the struggles for racial, gender, sexual, and class equality long before it was "PC" to do so. She died as she lived -- fighting forces larger than herself.
The publication of Movement In Black is an opportunity, both for those who were around the first time and those who are new to her work, to experience and enjoy Pat Parker's power.
About the Author(s):
Cheryl Clarke is a black lesbian feminist poet and facilitator of things black, queer, and feminist. She is the author of five books of poetry: BY MY PRECISE HAIRCUT (The Word Works, 2016), Narratives: Poems in the Tradition of Black Women (Kitchen Table/Women of Color, 1983), LIVING AS A LESBIAN (A Midsummer Night's Press, 2014), Humid Pitch (Firebrand Books, 1989), and Experimental Love (Firebrand Books, 1993), and of the critical study After Mecca: Women Poets and the Black Arts Movement (Rutgers Press, 2005). Her collected work, The Days of Good Looks: Prose and Poetry 1980-2005 was published in 2006 by Carroll and Graf. She received the David Kessler Award in 2013 from the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies for her service to LGBTQ communities. After 41 years in the administration of Rutgers University, she is now co-organizer of the Festival of Women Writers in Hobart, NY.
