The Heart of a Woman
Encyclopedia
The Heart of a Woman is an autobiography
by African-American writer Maya Angelou
, and was chosen as an Oprah's Book Club
selection in 1997. The book is the fourth installment in Angelou's series of six autobiographies, thus enlarging the autobiography in both form and content, something critic Mary Jane Lupton calls "a narrative structure unsurpassed in American autobiography". The title is taken from a poem by Harlem Renaissance
poet Georgia Douglas Johnson
, which connects Angelou with other African American female writers for the first time. Lupton also calls this book Angelou's "most introspective".
The Heart of a Woman recounts events in Angelou's life between 1957 and 1962, and follows her travels to California, New York City, Cairo, and Ghana, as she raises her teenage son, becomes a published author for the first time, becomes involved with the civil rights movement, and becomes romantically involved with a South African freedom fighter. Like Angelou's previous volumes, this book has been described as autobiographical fiction, but most critics and Angelou herself have characterized it as autobiography. Angelou continues to critique, change, and expand the genre, but is able to present herself as a model for living for the first time in her series.
As African-American literature critic Lyman B. Hagen states, "Faithful to the ongoing themes of survival, sense of self, and continuing education, The Heart of a Woman moves its central figures to a point of full personhood". Angelou continues to focus on and add to themes central in all of her books thus far, including those of race, journey, writing, and motherhood. She sees herself as a personal historian of the civil rights movement and of the Black literary scene of the late 50s and early 60s, and becomes an activist and protestor. The book follows Angelou to several places in both the US and Africa, but the most important journey she describes is "a voyage into the self". One of the most important themes of The Heart of a Woman is motherhood as Angelou continues to raise her teenage son. The book ends on a hopeful note, with Angelou's son leaving for college, and with Angelou looking forward to new-found independence and freedom.
(1971) was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize
.
As writer Hilton Als
states, Angelou was one of the first African American female writers to publicly discuss her personal life, and one of the first to use herself as a central character in her books, something she continues in The Heart of a Woman. Writer Julian Mayfield, who calls I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
, Angelou's first autobiography, "a work of art that eludes description", states that Angelou's work sets a precedent not only for other Black women writers, but for the genre of autobiography as a whole.
Als called Angelou one of the "pioneers of self-exposure", willing to focus honestly on the more negative aspects of her personality and choices. For example, while Angelou was composing her second autobiography, Gather Together in My Name
, she was concerned about how her readers would react to her disclosure that she had been a prostitute. Her husband Paul Du Feu talked her into publishing the book by encouraging her to "tell the truth as a writer" and "be honest about it". Through the writing of her life stories, however, Angelou has become recognized and highly respected as a spokesperson for Blacks and women. It made her, as scholar Joanne Braxton has stated, "without a doubt, ... America's most visible black woman autobiographer".
According to writer Lyman B. Hagen, Angelou takes the title of her fourth autobiography from a poem by Georgia Douglas Johnson
, a Harlem Renaissance
writer. Lyman states that although the title is "less striking or oblique than titles of her preceding books", it is an appropriate title because Johnson's poem mentions a caged bird and provides a connection to Angelou's first autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
, whose title was taken from a poem by Paul Lawrence Dunbar. American literature scholar Wallis Tinnie stated that the title suggests a "lonely aching" and exposes a spiritual dilemma also present in Angelou's first volume. Lupton believes that Johnson's use of the metaphor is different than Dunbar's because her bird is female whose isolation is sexual rather than racial. Critic James Robert Saunders states that the caged bird refers to Angelou after her failed marriage, but Lupton disagrees, stating that "the Maya Angelou of The Heart of a Woman is too strong and too self-determined to be kept in a cage".
Lupton states that The Heart of a Woman is the first time Angelou identifies with a female African American writer. Up to this point, her early literary influences were men like James Weldon Johnson
, Paul Lawrence Dunbar, and Shakespeare. She has stated that she always admired women writers like Anne Spencer
, Jessie Fauset, Nella Larsen
, and Zora Neale Hurston
, but she does not mention them in her first book, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. By choosing the title of this book, Angelou has included herself among other female writers and is an acknowledgment of her legacy as a Black woman writer.
. Angelou and her teenage son Guy have moved into a "houseboat commune in Sausalito". After a year, they move to a rented house near San Francisco. Singer Billie Holiday
visits Angelou and her son there, and Holiday sings a song to
Guy. Holiday tells Angelou, "You're going to be famous. But it won't be for singing".
In 1959, Angelou and Guy move to New York City. The transition is a difficult one for Guy; Angelou is forced to protect him from a gang leader. No longer satisfied with performing in nightclubs, she dedicates herself to acting, writing, political organizing, and her son. On the invitation of her friend, novelist John Killins, she becomes a member of the Harlem Writing Guild. She meets other important African American artists and writers, including James Baldwin
, who would become her mentor. She becomes a published writer for the first time.
Angelou becomes more politically active, participating in African American and African protest rallies, including a sit-in at the United Nations
following the death of Zaire's
prime minister, Patrice Lumumba
, that she helps organize. She meets Malcolm X
, and is struck by his good looks and magnetism. After hearing Martin Luther King, Jr.
speak, she and her friend, activist Godfry Cambridge, are inspired to produce a successful fundraiser for King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference
(SCLC), called Cabaret For Freedom. King names her coordinator of SCLC's office in New York. She performs in Jean Genet's
play, The Blacks
, with Roscoe Lee Brown, James Earl Jones
, and Cicely Tyson
.
In 1961, Angelou meets South African freedom fighter Vusumzi Make
. They never marry, but she and Guy move with him, first to London and then to Cairo, Egypt, where she plays "official wife to Make, who had become a political leader in exile". Their relationship is full of cultural conflicts; he expects her to be a subservient African wife, and she yearns for the freedom as a working woman. She learns that Make is too friendly with other women and is irresponsible with money, so she accepts a position as assistant editor at the Arab Observer
.
Eventually, Angelou and Make separate, but not before their relationship is examined by their community of friends. She accepts a job in Liberia
. She and Guy travel to Accra, Ghana, where he has been accepted to attend college. Guy is seriously injured in an automobile accident, so she accepts a position at the University of Ghana
and remains there while he recuperates. The Heart of a Woman ends with Guy leaving for college and Angelou remarking to herself, "At last, I'll be able to eat the whole breast of a roast chicken by myself".
Critic Mary Jane Lupton insists that all of Angelou's autobiographies conform to the genre's standard structure: they are written by a single author, they are chronological, and they contain elements of character, technique, and theme. In a 1983 interview with African American literature critic Claudia Tate, Angelou calls her books autobiographies. When speaking of her unique use of the genre, Angelou acknowledges that she follows the slave narrative
tradition of "speaking in the first-person singular talking about the first-person plural, always saying I meaning 'we'". Lupton compares The Heart of a Woman with other autobiographies, and states that for the first time in Angelou's series, she is able to present herself as a model for successful living like other autobiographies. However, Angelou's "woman's heart"—her perspective as a woman with concerns about her self-esteem and the conflicts she experiences about her lovers and her son—is what makes Angelou's autobiography different. Lupton insists that Angelou's feelings as described in The Heart of a Woman, which Lupton calls Angelou's "most introspective" book, are what dictates the book's form.
Angelou recognizes that there are fictional aspects to all her books; she tends to "diverge from the conventional notion of autobiography as truth". Her approach parallels the conventions of many African American autobiographies written during the abolitionist period in the US, when truth was often censored for purposes of self-protection. Author Lyman B. Hagen places Angelou in the long tradition of African American autobiography, but insists that she has created a unique interpretation of the autobiographical form. In a 1998 interview with journalist George Plimpton
, Angelou discusses her writing process, and "the sometimes slippery notion of truth in nonfiction" and memoirs. When asked if she changed the truth to improve her story, she states, "Sometimes I make a diameter from a composite of three or four people, because the essence in only one person is not sufficiently strong to be written about." Although Angelou has never admitted to changing the facts in her stories, she has used these facts to make an impact with the reader. As Hagen states, "One can assume that 'the essence of the data' is present in Angelou's work". Hagen also states that Angelou "fictionalizes, to enhance interest". Angelou's long-time editor, Robert Loomis
, agrees, stating that she could rewrite any of her books by changing the order of her facts to make a different impact on the reader.
According to Lupton, The Heart of a Woman is similar to Angelou's previous volumes because it is narrated from the intimate point of view of a woman and a mother, but by this time, she has "accumulated a multilayered memory". Angelou has become a serial autobiographer, something Lupton calls "a narrative structure unsurpassed in American autobiography", thus enlarging the autobiography in both form and content. In this book, Angelou draws upon what she has written before, "unveiling the various layers hidden in earlier volumes", as Lupton puts it, but without being repetitious. Lupton believes that Angelou is successful, citing the incident in this book when Angelou threatens the gang leader who has been threatening her son. The significance of this incident is more powerful when considered in light of Angelou's rape in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Lupton believes that Angelou's violent behavior is a "unconscious effort to rewrite her own history".
Angelou perfects the use of the vignette
in The Heart of a Woman, a literary technique she uses throughout her series. Vignettes are used throughout this book, to present both acquaintances and those she knows well. Two of her most developed vignettes in this book are of Billie Holiday and Malcolm X
. The vignettes of those she knew well, like Vusumki Make and her other relationships, also present her interactions and relationships. As Hagen states, although "frank talk seemed to be almost requisite for a commercially successful book" of the early 1980s, Angelou values monogamy, fidelity, and commitment in her relationships.
For the first and only time in Angelou's series, she repeats the same episode in detail—her son's horrible accident—at the end of this book and the beginning of her next one, All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes
. Critic Sondra O'Neale insists that this technique both centralizes each installment and connects each book in the series with each other; additionally, each volume "ends with abrupt suspense". As Lupton states, it also creates a strong and emotional link between this book and Traveling Shoes unlike any other in Angelou's series. Hagen adds that this technique repeats "Angelou's established pattern" of ending each of her books on a positive note. In this book, Angelou ends with a hopeful look to the future as her son strikes out on his own and she looks forward to more independence. As Hagen states, "Faithful to the ongoing themes of survival, sense of self, and continuing education, The Heart of a Woman moves its central figures to a point of full personhood."
In this book, Angelou becomes more "politicized" and develops a new sense of Black identity. As McPherson states, even Angelou's decision to leave show business is political. McPherson also states that this book is "a social and cultural history of Black Americans" during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Angelou sees herself as a "personal historian" of both the Civil Rights movement and the Black literary movement of the time. She becomes more attracted to the causes of Black militants, both in the US and in Africa, to the point of entering into a relationship with a significant militant, and becomes more committed to activism. It is during this time when she becomes an active political protestor, but she does not think of herself in that way. Instead, the focus is on herself, and she uses the autobiographical form to demonstrate how the Civil Rights movement influenced one person involved in it. According to Hagen, her contributions to civil rights, as a fundraiser and SCLC organizer were successful and "eminently effective".
. Like those narratives that focus on the writers' search for freedom from bondage, modern African American autobiographers like Angelou seek to develop "an authentic self" and the freedom to find it in their community. As McPherson states, "The journey to a distant goal, the return home, and the quest which involves the voyage out, achievement, and return are typical patterns in Black autobiography". The Heart of a Woman has three primary settings—the San Francisco Bay Area, New York, and Egypt--and two secondary ones—London and Accra
.
Lupton states that like all of Angelou's books, the structure of The Heart of a Woman is based upon a journey. Angelou emphasizes the theme of movement by opening her book with a spiritual ("The ole ark's a moverin'") McPherson calls "the theme song of the United States in 1957". This spiritual, which contains a reference to Noah's
ark, presents Angelou as a type of Noah and demonstrates her spirituality. Angelou also mentions Alan Ginsberg and On the Road
, the 1951 novel by Jack Kerouac
, thus connecting her own journey and uncertainty about the future with the journeys of literary figures. Even though the reason Angelou travels to Africa is an eventual failed relationship, she makes a connection with the continent, both in this book and in the one that follows it, All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes
. As Lupton states, "Africa is the site of her growth". Angelou's time in Africa makes her more aware of her African roots as she searches for her "ancestral past". Lupton insists, however, that although Angelou journeys to many places in the book, the most important journey she describes is "a voyage into the self".
According to Als, Angelou's concept of herself as an artist changed after her encounter with Billie Holiday early in the book. Als believes that up to that point, Angelou's career was more about fame than about art. As Als puts it, "Developing her artistry was not the point". Als also believes that the "blur of activity" that made up her career, instead of revealing her ambition, reveals "a woman who
is only moderately talented and perpetually unable to understand who she is". Als explains this by stating that Angelou, in spite of the mistakes of her youth, needed the approval and acceptance of others, and observes that Holiday was able to perceive this. Holiday tells her, "You're going to be famous. But it won't be for singing".
Angelou has begun to write sketches, songs, and short stories, and shows her work to her friend John Killens, who sees her potential invites her to New York City to develop her writing skills. She joins the Harlem Writers Guild, and receives feedback from other talented and aspiring African American authors like Killens, Angelou's close friend Rosa Guy
, and Caribbean writer Paule Marshall
, who, like her, would eventually make significant contributions to African American literature. Angelou dedicates herself to improving her craft, forcing herself to understand the technical aspects of writing. As Lupton states, "Readers can actually envision in this volume the distinguished artist who becomes the Maya Angelou of the 1990s".
Lupton goes further by stating that not only is motherhood important in Angelou's books, so is "the motif of the responsible mother", starting with Angelou's own mother in Caged Bird (with whom she has a significant encounter with in this book, before moving to New York) and coming to a resolution in her previous book, Singin' and Swingin'. Her commitment to care for her son is revealed in her confrontation with the street gang leader who has threatened Guy. As Lupton states, Angelou "becomes in this episode a representation of maternal power". In this episode, which Lupton calls "the most dramatic episode of The Heart of a Woman", Angelou no longer is the mother torn by self-doubt in Gather Together in My Name, but is now a powerful, strong, and aggressive Black mother. As Lupton states, she has become what scholar Joanne M. Braxton calls the "outraged mother", which represents the Black mother's strength and dedication and is found throughout slave narratives. Lupton also believes that Angelou has become a "reincarnation" of her grandmother, a central figure in Caged Bird.
As Lupton puts it, by the end of The Heart of a Woman, Angelou "finds herself increasingly alone". After Guy recuperates from a serious car accident, he leaves her to attend college. The final word in the book is the negative "myself", a word that Lupton insists signifies Angelou's new-found freedom and independence. Lupton states that Angelou is no longer defined as someone's wife or mother: "she is simply herself". Tinnie calls this moment one of "illusive transcendence" and "a scene of hope and completion". For the first time in many years, Angelou will be able to eat a chicken breast alone, something that is valued throughout her books, especially Caged Bird. This thought, which Lupton calls "perfectly formed", echo both Gather Together and Singin' and Swingin', which ends in Angelou's "vows of innocence and commitment". Tinnie states that The Heart of a Woman's "lonely aching" hearkens back to the poem that inspires the book's title, and calls it "a scene of hope and completion".
Choice Magazine
agrees, stating that although Caged Bird was the best of Angelou's autobiographies, "every book since has been very much worth the reading and pondering".
Critic Janet B. Blundell found The Heart of a Woman "lively, revealing, and worth the reading", but also found it "too chatty and anecdotal". Hagen responded to this criticism by stating that all of Angelou's books consist of episodes connected by theme and character. Sheree Crute, writing for Ms.
, seems to appreciate the episodic nature of Angelou's writing and praises her for her "wonderfully unaffected story telling skills". Cudjoe calls The Heart of a Woman "the most political segment of Angelou's autobiographical statement".
In 1993, Angelou recited her poem "On the Pulse of Morning
" at President Bill Clinton's
inauguration; in the following week, sales of her works, including The Heart of a Woman, rose by 300–600 percent. Bantam Books reprinted 400,000 copies of her books to meet demand. Random House
, which published Angelou's hardcover books and the poem later that year, reported that they sold more of her books in January 1993 than they did in all of 1992, marking a 1,200 percent increase. In 1997, Angelou's friend Oprah Winfrey
named The Heart of a Woman as a selection in her book club
.
Autobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...
by African-American writer Maya Angelou
Maya Angelou
Maya Angelou is an American author and poet who has been called "America's most visible black female autobiographer" by scholar Joanne M. Braxton. She is best known for her series of six autobiographical volumes, which focus on her childhood and early adult experiences. The first and most highly...
, and was chosen as an Oprah's Book Club
Oprah's Book Club
Oprah's Book Club was a book discussion club segment of the American talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show, highlighting books chosen by host Oprah Winfrey. Winfrey started the book club in 1996, selecting a new novel for viewers to read and discuss each month. The Club ended its 15-year run, along with...
selection in 1997. The book is the fourth installment in Angelou's series of six autobiographies, thus enlarging the autobiography in both form and content, something critic Mary Jane Lupton calls "a narrative structure unsurpassed in American autobiography". The title is taken from a poem by Harlem Renaissance
Harlem Renaissance
The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned the 1920s and 1930s. At the time, it was known as the "New Negro Movement", named after the 1925 anthology by Alain Locke...
poet Georgia Douglas Johnson
Georgia Douglas Johnson
Georgia Blanche Douglas Camp Johnson better known as Georgia Douglas Johnson was an American poet and a member of the Harlem Renaissance.-Early life and education:...
, which connects Angelou with other African American female writers for the first time. Lupton also calls this book Angelou's "most introspective".
The Heart of a Woman recounts events in Angelou's life between 1957 and 1962, and follows her travels to California, New York City, Cairo, and Ghana, as she raises her teenage son, becomes a published author for the first time, becomes involved with the civil rights movement, and becomes romantically involved with a South African freedom fighter. Like Angelou's previous volumes, this book has been described as autobiographical fiction, but most critics and Angelou herself have characterized it as autobiography. Angelou continues to critique, change, and expand the genre, but is able to present herself as a model for living for the first time in her series.
As African-American literature critic Lyman B. Hagen states, "Faithful to the ongoing themes of survival, sense of self, and continuing education, The Heart of a Woman moves its central figures to a point of full personhood". Angelou continues to focus on and add to themes central in all of her books thus far, including those of race, journey, writing, and motherhood. She sees herself as a personal historian of the civil rights movement and of the Black literary scene of the late 50s and early 60s, and becomes an activist and protestor. The book follows Angelou to several places in both the US and Africa, but the most important journey she describes is "a voyage into the self". One of the most important themes of The Heart of a Woman is motherhood as Angelou continues to raise her teenage son. The book ends on a hopeful note, with Angelou's son leaving for college, and with Angelou looking forward to new-found independence and freedom.
Background
The Heart of a Woman, published in 1981, is the fourth installment of Maya Angelou's series of six autobiographies. The success of Angelou's previous autobiographies and the publication of three volumes of poetry had brought Angelou a considerable amount of fame by 1981. And Still I Rise, published in 1978, reinforced Angelou's success as a writer. Her first volume of poetry, Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I DiiieJust Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie
Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie is a 1971 anthology of 38 poems by Maya Angelou, nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1972...
(1971) was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
.
As writer Hilton Als
Hilton Als
Hilton Als is an American writer and theater critic who writes for The New Yorker magazine.Als is a former staff writer for The Village Voice and former editor-at-large at Vibe magazine....
states, Angelou was one of the first African American female writers to publicly discuss her personal life, and one of the first to use herself as a central character in her books, something she continues in The Heart of a Woman. Writer Julian Mayfield, who calls I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is the 1969 autobiography about the early years of African-American writer and poet Maya Angelou. The first in a six-volume series, it is a coming-of-age story that illustrates how strength of character and a love of literature can help overcome racism and trauma...
, Angelou's first autobiography, "a work of art that eludes description", states that Angelou's work sets a precedent not only for other Black women writers, but for the genre of autobiography as a whole.
Als called Angelou one of the "pioneers of self-exposure", willing to focus honestly on the more negative aspects of her personality and choices. For example, while Angelou was composing her second autobiography, Gather Together in My Name
Gather Together in My Name
Gather Together in My Name is an autobiography by Maya Angelou. It is the second book in Angelou's series of six autobiographies, and takes place immediately following the events described in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Written three years after Caged Bird, the book "depicts a single...
, she was concerned about how her readers would react to her disclosure that she had been a prostitute. Her husband Paul Du Feu talked her into publishing the book by encouraging her to "tell the truth as a writer" and "be honest about it". Through the writing of her life stories, however, Angelou has become recognized and highly respected as a spokesperson for Blacks and women. It made her, as scholar Joanne Braxton has stated, "without a doubt, ... America's most visible black woman autobiographer".
Title
The heart of a woman goes forth with the dawn,
As a lone bird, soft winging, so restlessly on,
Afar o’er life’s turrets and vales does it roam
In the wake of those echoes the heart calls home.
The heart of a woman falls back with the night,
And enters some alien cage in its plight,
And tries to forget it has dreamed of the stars
While it breaks, breaks, breaks on the sheltering bars.
-"The Heart of a Woman", by Georgia Douglas JohnsonGeorgia Douglas JohnsonGeorgia Blanche Douglas Camp Johnson better known as Georgia Douglas Johnson was an American poet and a member of the Harlem Renaissance.-Early life and education:...
According to writer Lyman B. Hagen, Angelou takes the title of her fourth autobiography from a poem by Georgia Douglas Johnson
Georgia Douglas Johnson
Georgia Blanche Douglas Camp Johnson better known as Georgia Douglas Johnson was an American poet and a member of the Harlem Renaissance.-Early life and education:...
, a Harlem Renaissance
Harlem Renaissance
The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned the 1920s and 1930s. At the time, it was known as the "New Negro Movement", named after the 1925 anthology by Alain Locke...
writer. Lyman states that although the title is "less striking or oblique than titles of her preceding books", it is an appropriate title because Johnson's poem mentions a caged bird and provides a connection to Angelou's first autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is the 1969 autobiography about the early years of African-American writer and poet Maya Angelou. The first in a six-volume series, it is a coming-of-age story that illustrates how strength of character and a love of literature can help overcome racism and trauma...
, whose title was taken from a poem by Paul Lawrence Dunbar. American literature scholar Wallis Tinnie stated that the title suggests a "lonely aching" and exposes a spiritual dilemma also present in Angelou's first volume. Lupton believes that Johnson's use of the metaphor is different than Dunbar's because her bird is female whose isolation is sexual rather than racial. Critic James Robert Saunders states that the caged bird refers to Angelou after her failed marriage, but Lupton disagrees, stating that "the Maya Angelou of The Heart of a Woman is too strong and too self-determined to be kept in a cage".
Lupton states that The Heart of a Woman is the first time Angelou identifies with a female African American writer. Up to this point, her early literary influences were men like James Weldon Johnson
James Weldon Johnson
James Weldon Johnson was an American author, politician, diplomat, critic, journalist, poet, anthologist, educator, lawyer, songwriter, and early civil rights activist. Johnson is remembered best for his leadership within the NAACP, as well as for his writing, which includes novels, poems, and...
, Paul Lawrence Dunbar, and Shakespeare. She has stated that she always admired women writers like Anne Spencer
Anne Spencer
Annie Bethel Spencer was an American Black poet and active participant in the New Negro Movement and Harlem Renaissance period....
, Jessie Fauset, Nella Larsen
Nella Larsen
Nellallitea 'Nella' Larsen Nellallitea 'Nella' Larsen Nellallitea 'Nella' Larsen (born Nellie Walker (April 13, 1891 – March 30, 1964), was an American novelist of the Harlem Renaissance. She published two novels and a few short stories. Though her literary output was scant, what she wrote earned...
, and Zora Neale Hurston
Zora Neale Hurston
Zora Neale Hurston was an American folklorist, anthropologist, and author during the time of the Harlem Renaissance...
, but she does not mention them in her first book, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. By choosing the title of this book, Angelou has included herself among other female writers and is an acknowledgment of her legacy as a Black woman writer.
Plot summary
The Heart of a Woman, which takes place between 1957 and 1962, begins shortly after the end of Angelou's previous autobiography, Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like ChristmasSingin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas
Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas is the third book of Maya Angelou's six-volume autobiography series. Set between 1949 and 1955, the book spans Angelou's early twenties. In this volume, Angelou describes her struggles to support her young son, form meaningful relationships and...
. Angelou and her teenage son Guy have moved into a "houseboat commune in Sausalito". After a year, they move to a rented house near San Francisco. Singer Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday was an American jazz singer and songwriter. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and musical partner Lester Young, Holiday had a seminal influence on jazz and pop singing...
visits Angelou and her son there, and Holiday sings a song to
Guy. Holiday tells Angelou, "You're going to be famous. But it won't be for singing".
James Baldwin
James Baldwin was an American novelist, essayist and civil rights activist.James Baldwin may also refer to:-Writers:*James Baldwin , American educator, writer and administrator...
, who would become her mentor. She becomes a published writer for the first time.
Angelou becomes more politically active, participating in African American and African protest rallies, including a sit-in at the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
following the death of Zaire's
Zaire
The Republic of Zaire was the name of the present Democratic Republic of the Congo between 27 October 1971 and 17 May 1997. The name of Zaire derives from the , itself an adaptation of the Kongo word nzere or nzadi, or "the river that swallows all rivers".-Self-proclaimed Father of the Nation:In...
prime minister, Patrice Lumumba
Patrice Lumumba
Patrice Émery Lumumba was a Congolese independence leader and the first legally elected Prime Minister of the Republic of the Congo after he helped win its independence from Belgium in June 1960. Only ten weeks later, Lumumba's government was deposed in a coup during the Congo Crisis...
, that she helps organize. She meets Malcolm X
Malcolm X
Malcolm X , born Malcolm Little and also known as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz , was an African American Muslim minister and human rights activist. To his admirers he was a courageous advocate for the rights of African Americans, a man who indicted white America in the harshest terms for its...
, and is struck by his good looks and magnetism. After hearing Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...
speak, she and her friend, activist Godfry Cambridge, are inspired to produce a successful fundraiser for King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
The Southern Christian Leadership Conference is an African-American civil rights organization. SCLC was closely associated with its first president, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr...
(SCLC), called Cabaret For Freedom. King names her coordinator of SCLC's office in New York. She performs in Jean Genet's
Jean Genet
Jean Genet was a prominent and controversial French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. Early in his life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but later took to writing...
play, The Blacks
The Blacks (play)
The Blacks: A Clown Show is a play by the French dramatist Jean Genet. Published in 1958, it was first performed in a production directed by Roger Blin at the Théatre de Lutèce in Paris, which opened on 28 October 1959....
, with Roscoe Lee Brown, James Earl Jones
James Earl Jones
James Earl Jones is an American actor. He is well-known for his distinctive bass voice and for his portrayal of characters of substance, gravitas and leadership...
, and Cicely Tyson
Cicely Tyson
Cicely Tyson is an American actress. A successful stage actress, Tyson is also known for her Oscar-nominated role in the film Sounder and the television movies The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman and Roots....
.
In 1961, Angelou meets South African freedom fighter Vusumzi Make
Vusumzi Make
Vusumzi L. Make was a South African civil rights activist and lawyer. He is an ex-husband of American poet Maya Angelou; the two married in 1960, lived together in Cairo, Egypt for three years, and divorced in 1963...
. They never marry, but she and Guy move with him, first to London and then to Cairo, Egypt, where she plays "official wife to Make, who had become a political leader in exile". Their relationship is full of cultural conflicts; he expects her to be a subservient African wife, and she yearns for the freedom as a working woman. She learns that Make is too friendly with other women and is irresponsible with money, so she accepts a position as assistant editor at the Arab Observer
Arab Observer
The Arab Observer was an English language weekly newsmagazine published from Cairo, Egypt between the years of 1960 and 1966. At the time, it was one of the only English language publications from the Middle East. Although not officially a state organ, it generally followed the political...
.
Eventually, Angelou and Make separate, but not before their relationship is examined by their community of friends. She accepts a job in Liberia
Liberia
Liberia , officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Sierra Leone on the west, Guinea on the north and Côte d'Ivoire on the east. Liberia's coastline is composed of mostly mangrove forests while the more sparsely populated inland consists of forests that open...
. She and Guy travel to Accra, Ghana, where he has been accepted to attend college. Guy is seriously injured in an automobile accident, so she accepts a position at the University of Ghana
University of Ghana
The University of Ghana is the oldest and largest of the thirteen Ghanaian universities and tertiary institutions. It is one of the best universities in Africa and by far the most prestigious in West Africa...
and remains there while he recuperates. The Heart of a Woman ends with Guy leaving for college and Angelou remarking to herself, "At last, I'll be able to eat the whole breast of a roast chicken by myself".
Genre
All six of Angelou's installments of her life story continue the long tradition of African American autobiography. Starting with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Angelou makes a deliberate attempt, while writing her books, to challenge the usual structure of the autobiography by critiquing, changing, and expanding the genre. Her use of fiction-writing techniques such as dialogue, characterization, and thematic development has often led reviewers to categorize her books as autobiographical fiction. Angelou states in a 1989 interview that she is the only "serious" writer to choose the genre to express herself. As critic Susan Gilbert states, Angelou reports not one person's story, but the collective's. Scholar Selwyn R. Cudjoe agrees, and views Angelou as representative of the convention in African American autobiography as a public gesture that speaks for an entire group of people.Critic Mary Jane Lupton insists that all of Angelou's autobiographies conform to the genre's standard structure: they are written by a single author, they are chronological, and they contain elements of character, technique, and theme. In a 1983 interview with African American literature critic Claudia Tate, Angelou calls her books autobiographies. When speaking of her unique use of the genre, Angelou acknowledges that she follows the slave narrative
Slave narrative
The slave narrative is a literary form which grew out of the written accounts of enslaved Africans in Britain and its colonies, including the later United States, Canada and Caribbean nations...
tradition of "speaking in the first-person singular talking about the first-person plural, always saying I meaning 'we'". Lupton compares The Heart of a Woman with other autobiographies, and states that for the first time in Angelou's series, she is able to present herself as a model for successful living like other autobiographies. However, Angelou's "woman's heart"—her perspective as a woman with concerns about her self-esteem and the conflicts she experiences about her lovers and her son—is what makes Angelou's autobiography different. Lupton insists that Angelou's feelings as described in The Heart of a Woman, which Lupton calls Angelou's "most introspective" book, are what dictates the book's form.
Angelou recognizes that there are fictional aspects to all her books; she tends to "diverge from the conventional notion of autobiography as truth". Her approach parallels the conventions of many African American autobiographies written during the abolitionist period in the US, when truth was often censored for purposes of self-protection. Author Lyman B. Hagen places Angelou in the long tradition of African American autobiography, but insists that she has created a unique interpretation of the autobiographical form. In a 1998 interview with journalist George Plimpton
George Plimpton
George Ames Plimpton was an American journalist, writer, editor, and actor. He is widely known for his sports writing and for helping to found The Paris Review.-Early life:...
, Angelou discusses her writing process, and "the sometimes slippery notion of truth in nonfiction" and memoirs. When asked if she changed the truth to improve her story, she states, "Sometimes I make a diameter from a composite of three or four people, because the essence in only one person is not sufficiently strong to be written about." Although Angelou has never admitted to changing the facts in her stories, she has used these facts to make an impact with the reader. As Hagen states, "One can assume that 'the essence of the data' is present in Angelou's work". Hagen also states that Angelou "fictionalizes, to enhance interest". Angelou's long-time editor, Robert Loomis
Robert Loomis
Robert Loomis is an executive book editor at Random House, where he has worked since 1957. He has been called "one of publishing's hall of fame editors."...
, agrees, stating that she could rewrite any of her books by changing the order of her facts to make a different impact on the reader.
According to Lupton, The Heart of a Woman is similar to Angelou's previous volumes because it is narrated from the intimate point of view of a woman and a mother, but by this time, she has "accumulated a multilayered memory". Angelou has become a serial autobiographer, something Lupton calls "a narrative structure unsurpassed in American autobiography", thus enlarging the autobiography in both form and content. In this book, Angelou draws upon what she has written before, "unveiling the various layers hidden in earlier volumes", as Lupton puts it, but without being repetitious. Lupton believes that Angelou is successful, citing the incident in this book when Angelou threatens the gang leader who has been threatening her son. The significance of this incident is more powerful when considered in light of Angelou's rape in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Lupton believes that Angelou's violent behavior is a "unconscious effort to rewrite her own history".
Style
According to Lupton, Angelou does not begin to create her own narrative until her fourth volume. The Heart of a Woman depends less upon the strategies of fiction than in her previous books. For example, there is less dialogue and dramatic episodes to convey action or emotion. Lupton believes that The Heart of a Woman is more uplifting than its predecessors, something she states is due to Angelou's resolution of her earlier conflict of becoming a successful performer and her duties as a single mother.Vignette (literature)
In theatrical script writing, sketch stories, and poetry, a vignette is a short impressionistic scene that focuses on one moment or gives a trenchant impression about a character, an idea, or a setting and sometimes an object...
in The Heart of a Woman, a literary technique she uses throughout her series. Vignettes are used throughout this book, to present both acquaintances and those she knows well. Two of her most developed vignettes in this book are of Billie Holiday and Malcolm X
Malcolm X
Malcolm X , born Malcolm Little and also known as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz , was an African American Muslim minister and human rights activist. To his admirers he was a courageous advocate for the rights of African Americans, a man who indicted white America in the harshest terms for its...
. The vignettes of those she knew well, like Vusumki Make and her other relationships, also present her interactions and relationships. As Hagen states, although "frank talk seemed to be almost requisite for a commercially successful book" of the early 1980s, Angelou values monogamy, fidelity, and commitment in her relationships.
For the first and only time in Angelou's series, she repeats the same episode in detail—her son's horrible accident—at the end of this book and the beginning of her next one, All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes
All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes
All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes, published in 1986, is the fifth book in African-American writer and poet Maya Angelou's six-volume autobiography series. Set between 1962 and 1965, the book begins when Angelou is thirty-three years old, and recounts the years she lived in Accra, Ghana...
. Critic Sondra O'Neale insists that this technique both centralizes each installment and connects each book in the series with each other; additionally, each volume "ends with abrupt suspense". As Lupton states, it also creates a strong and emotional link between this book and Traveling Shoes unlike any other in Angelou's series. Hagen adds that this technique repeats "Angelou's established pattern" of ending each of her books on a positive note. In this book, Angelou ends with a hopeful look to the future as her son strikes out on his own and she looks forward to more independence. As Hagen states, "Faithful to the ongoing themes of survival, sense of self, and continuing education, The Heart of a Woman moves its central figures to a point of full personhood."
Race
Race continues to be a theme in The Heart of a Woman, as it has been throughout Angelou's series of autobiographies up to this time. When the book opens, Angelou and Guy are living in an experimental commune with whites, in an attempt to participate in the new openness between Blacks and whites. She is not completely comfortable with the arrangement, however; as Lupton points out, Angelou never names her roommates, even though "naming" has been an important theme in her books thus far. For the most part, Angelou is able to "cheerfully coexist" with whites, but she occasionally encounters prejudice similar to earlier episodes, like when she requires the assistance of white friends to rent a home in a segregated neighborhood in the opening of this book. Lupton states that compared to her other books, Angelou "is a long way" from her interactions with whites and people of other races. Hagen calls the descriptions of whites and the hopes for eventual equality in this book "optimistic". Angelou continues, however, her indictment of white power structure and her protests against racial injustice that has been a theme throughout all her books. Instead of offering solutions, however, Hagen states that she simply reports, reacts, and dramatizes events.In this book, Angelou becomes more "politicized" and develops a new sense of Black identity. As McPherson states, even Angelou's decision to leave show business is political. McPherson also states that this book is "a social and cultural history of Black Americans" during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Angelou sees herself as a "personal historian" of both the Civil Rights movement and the Black literary movement of the time. She becomes more attracted to the causes of Black militants, both in the US and in Africa, to the point of entering into a relationship with a significant militant, and becomes more committed to activism. It is during this time when she becomes an active political protestor, but she does not think of herself in that way. Instead, the focus is on herself, and she uses the autobiographical form to demonstrate how the Civil Rights movement influenced one person involved in it. According to Hagen, her contributions to civil rights, as a fundraiser and SCLC organizer were successful and "eminently effective".
Journey
Travel is a common theme in American autobiography as a whole; as McPherson states, it is something of a national myth to Americans as a people. This is also the case for African American autobiography, which has its roots in the slave narrativeSlave narrative
The slave narrative is a literary form which grew out of the written accounts of enslaved Africans in Britain and its colonies, including the later United States, Canada and Caribbean nations...
. Like those narratives that focus on the writers' search for freedom from bondage, modern African American autobiographers like Angelou seek to develop "an authentic self" and the freedom to find it in their community. As McPherson states, "The journey to a distant goal, the return home, and the quest which involves the voyage out, achievement, and return are typical patterns in Black autobiography". The Heart of a Woman has three primary settings—the San Francisco Bay Area, New York, and Egypt--and two secondary ones—London and Accra
Accra
Accra is the capital and largest city of Ghana, with an urban population of 1,658,937 according to the 2000 census. Accra is also the capital of the Greater Accra Region and of the Accra Metropolitan District, with which it is coterminous...
.
Noah
Noah was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the tenth and last of the antediluvian Patriarchs. The biblical story of Noah is contained in chapters 6–9 of the book of Genesis, where he saves his family and representatives of all animals from the flood by constructing an ark...
ark, presents Angelou as a type of Noah and demonstrates her spirituality. Angelou also mentions Alan Ginsberg and On the Road
On the Road
On the Road is a novel by American writer Jack Kerouac, written in April 1951, and published by Viking Press in 1957. It is a largely autobiographical work that was based on the spontaneous road trips of Kerouac and his friends across mid-century America. It is often considered a defining work of...
, the 1951 novel by Jack Kerouac
Jack Kerouac
Jean-Louis "Jack" Lebris de Kerouac was an American novelist and poet. He is considered a literary iconoclast and, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Kerouac is recognized for his spontaneous method of writing, covering topics such as Catholic...
, thus connecting her own journey and uncertainty about the future with the journeys of literary figures. Even though the reason Angelou travels to Africa is an eventual failed relationship, she makes a connection with the continent, both in this book and in the one that follows it, All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes
All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes
All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes, published in 1986, is the fifth book in African-American writer and poet Maya Angelou's six-volume autobiography series. Set between 1962 and 1965, the book begins when Angelou is thirty-three years old, and recounts the years she lived in Accra, Ghana...
. As Lupton states, "Africa is the site of her growth". Angelou's time in Africa makes her more aware of her African roots as she searches for her "ancestral past". Lupton insists, however, that although Angelou journeys to many places in the book, the most important journey she describes is "a voyage into the self".
Writing
Angelou's primary role in Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas was stage performer, but in The Heart of a Woman, she changes from someone who uses others' method of expression—the songs and dances of the African, Caribbean, and African American oral tradition—to a writer. Lupton believes that Angelou makes this decision for political reasons, as she becomes more involved with the Civil Rights movement, but also so that she can care for her son. Lupton also states that for the first time in Angelou's autobiographies, Angelou "begins her account of herself as a writer". The Heart of a Woman marks the first time Angelou begins to identify with other Black women writers as well. As Lupton states, Angelou has been devoted to several writers since her childhood, but this is the first time she mentions female authors. Up to this point, her identification has been with male writers. Lupton believes Angelou's new affiliations with female writers is due to her emerging feminism.is only moderately talented and perpetually unable to understand who she is". Als explains this by stating that Angelou, in spite of the mistakes of her youth, needed the approval and acceptance of others, and observes that Holiday was able to perceive this. Holiday tells her, "You're going to be famous. But it won't be for singing".
Angelou has begun to write sketches, songs, and short stories, and shows her work to her friend John Killens, who sees her potential invites her to New York City to develop her writing skills. She joins the Harlem Writers Guild, and receives feedback from other talented and aspiring African American authors like Killens, Angelou's close friend Rosa Guy
Rosa Guy
Rosa Cuthbert Guy is an American writer.-Biography:Rosa Guy was raised in Harlem from the age of seven and now lives in New York. She immigrated to Harlem, New York in 1932. Soon after her parents, Henry and Audrey Cuthbert, died, she and her sister went to many foster homes...
, and Caribbean writer Paule Marshall
Paule Marshall
Paule Marshall is an American author. She was born Valenza Pauline Burke in Brooklyn to Barbadian parents and educated at Girls High School, Brooklyn College and Hunter College . Early in her career, she wrote poetry, but later returned to prose...
, who, like her, would eventually make significant contributions to African American literature. Angelou dedicates herself to improving her craft, forcing herself to understand the technical aspects of writing. As Lupton states, "Readers can actually envision in this volume the distinguished artist who becomes the Maya Angelou of the 1990s".
Motherhood
According to Lupton, motherhood, a theme throughout all of Angelou's autobiographies, becomes more complex in The Heart of a Woman. Even though Guy is going through the developmentally appropriate adolescent separation from his mother, which she struggles with, they remain close in this book. As Lupton puts it, "long years of living and mothering" and her success as a writer, actress, and activist, Angelou behaves more competently and with more maturity, both professionally and as a mother, and her self-assurance becomes a major part of her personality. Her past conflict between her professional and personal lives are resolved, she fulfills her promise made to Guy at the end of Singin' and Swingin that they would never be separated again. Lupton believes, however, that Angelou resolves this conflict by subordinating her needs to her child's, a resolution many mothers make.Lupton goes further by stating that not only is motherhood important in Angelou's books, so is "the motif of the responsible mother", starting with Angelou's own mother in Caged Bird (with whom she has a significant encounter with in this book, before moving to New York) and coming to a resolution in her previous book, Singin' and Swingin'. Her commitment to care for her son is revealed in her confrontation with the street gang leader who has threatened Guy. As Lupton states, Angelou "becomes in this episode a representation of maternal power". In this episode, which Lupton calls "the most dramatic episode of The Heart of a Woman", Angelou no longer is the mother torn by self-doubt in Gather Together in My Name, but is now a powerful, strong, and aggressive Black mother. As Lupton states, she has become what scholar Joanne M. Braxton calls the "outraged mother", which represents the Black mother's strength and dedication and is found throughout slave narratives. Lupton also believes that Angelou has become a "reincarnation" of her grandmother, a central figure in Caged Bird.
As Lupton puts it, by the end of The Heart of a Woman, Angelou "finds herself increasingly alone". After Guy recuperates from a serious car accident, he leaves her to attend college. The final word in the book is the negative "myself", a word that Lupton insists signifies Angelou's new-found freedom and independence. Lupton states that Angelou is no longer defined as someone's wife or mother: "she is simply herself". Tinnie calls this moment one of "illusive transcendence" and "a scene of hope and completion". For the first time in many years, Angelou will be able to eat a chicken breast alone, something that is valued throughout her books, especially Caged Bird. This thought, which Lupton calls "perfectly formed", echo both Gather Together and Singin' and Swingin', which ends in Angelou's "vows of innocence and commitment". Tinnie states that The Heart of a Woman's "lonely aching" hearkens back to the poem that inspires the book's title, and calls it "a scene of hope and completion".
Critical reception and sales
As with Angelou's previous books, The Heart of a Woman critics responded favorably to it, especially its professional qualities. Angelou's first autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, is Angelou's most highly acclaimed autobiographies and her other volumes are regularly judged and compared to her first, but her subsequent books, including The Heart of a Woman, has been generally well received by critics. The American Library Association'sAmerican Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
Choice Magazine
Choice magazine
CHOICE Magazine is a publication of the Australian Consumers' Association, a non-profit organisation founded in 1959 to research and advocate on behalf of Australian consumers. The organisation trades as CHOICE and is similar to Consumer Reports in the United States...
agrees, stating that although Caged Bird was the best of Angelou's autobiographies, "every book since has been very much worth the reading and pondering".
Ms.
Ms. or Ms is an English honorific used with the last name or full name of a woman. According to The Emily Post Institute, Ms...
, seems to appreciate the episodic nature of Angelou's writing and praises her for her "wonderfully unaffected story telling skills". Cudjoe calls The Heart of a Woman "the most political segment of Angelou's autobiographical statement".
In 1993, Angelou recited her poem "On the Pulse of Morning
On the Pulse of Morning
On the Pulse of Morning is a poem by Maya Angelou. She read it at the inauguration of President Bill Clinton on January 20, 1993. With her public recitation, Angelou became the second poet in history to read a poem at a presidential inauguration...
" at President Bill Clinton's
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
inauguration; in the following week, sales of her works, including The Heart of a Woman, rose by 300–600 percent. Bantam Books reprinted 400,000 copies of her books to meet demand. Random House
Random House
Random House, Inc. is the largest general-interest trade book publisher in the world. It has been owned since 1998 by the German private media corporation Bertelsmann and has become the umbrella brand for Bertelsmann book publishing. Random House also has a movie production arm, Random House Films,...
, which published Angelou's hardcover books and the poem later that year, reported that they sold more of her books in January 1993 than they did in all of 1992, marking a 1,200 percent increase. In 1997, Angelou's friend Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey is an American media proprietor, talk show host, actress, producer and philanthropist. Winfrey is best known for her self-titled, multi-award-winning talk show, which has become the highest-rated program of its kind in history and was nationally syndicated from 1986 to 2011...
named The Heart of a Woman as a selection in her book club
Oprah's Book Club
Oprah's Book Club was a book discussion club segment of the American talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show, highlighting books chosen by host Oprah Winfrey. Winfrey started the book club in 1996, selecting a new novel for viewers to read and discuss each month. The Club ended its 15-year run, along with...
.