Claude mckay american national biography online

Claude McKay was born Festus Claudius McKay in Sunny Ville, Jamaica, on September 15, His parents, Thomas Francis and Hannah Ann Elizabeth (née Edwards).

Claude McKay was an influential Harlem Renaissance poet, as well as a journalist and author.

McKay, Claude (15 September –22 May ), poet, novelist, and journalist, was born Festus Claudius McKay in Sunny Ville, Clarendon Parish, Jamaica.

Published online: 31 May A version of this article originally appeared in African American National Biography.

Claude McKay, renowned author of several novels and anthologies was born in Jamaica on September 15, could be considered a significant year in.

McKay, Claude (15 September –22 May ), poet, novelist, and journalist, was born Festus Claudius McKay in Sunny Ville, Clarendon Parish, Jamaica..

Claude McKay

Jamaican American writer and poet (1889–1948)

For the Australian journalist, see Claude Eric Fergusson McKay.

Festus Claudius "Claude" McKayOJ (September 15, 1890^[1] – May 22, 1948) was a Jamaican-American writer and poet.

He was a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance.

Born in Jamaica, McKay first travelled to the United States to attend college, and encountered W. E. B. Du Bois's The Souls of Black Folk which stimulated McKay's interest in political involvement.

He moved to New York City in 1914 and, in 1919, he wrote "If We Must Die", one of his best known works, a widely reprinted sonnet responding to the wave of white-on-black race riots and lynchings following the conclusion of the First World War.

McKay also wrote five novels, Home to Harlem (1928), a best-seller that won the Harmon Gold Award for Literature, Banjo (1929), Banana Bottom (1933), Harlem Glory (written in 1938-1940, published in 1990), Amiable With Big Teeth: A