Ishmael Reed
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| Ishmael Reed | |
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Reed (second from left)
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| Born | Ishmael Scott Reed February 22, 1938 Chattanooga, Tennessee, U.S. |
| Occupation | Poet, essayist, novelist |
| Education | University of Buffalo |
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www.ishmaelreed.org |
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Reed's work has often sought to represent neglected African and African-American perspectives; his energy and advocacy have centered more broadly on neglected peoples and perspectives, irrespective of their cultural origins.[10]
Contents
Life and career
Reed was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, but grew up in Buffalo, New York, where he attended the University of Buffalo, a private university that became part of the state public university system after he left. The university awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1995.In 1998, Reed spoke about his influences in an interview: "I've probably been more influenced by poets than by novelists — the Harlem Renaissance poets, the Beat poets, the American surrealist Ted Joans. Poets have to be more attuned to originality, coming up with lines and associations the ordinary prose writer wouldn't think of."[11]
He moved to New York City in 1962 and co-founded with Walter Bowart the East Village Other, a well-known underground publication. He was also a member of the Umbra Writers Workshop, an organization among whose members were some that helped establish the Black Arts Movement and promoted a Black Aesthetic, although Ishmael Reed was never a participant in that movement.
In 2005, Reed retired from teaching at the University of California, Berkeley, where he taught for thirty-five years. He currently lives in Oakland, California, with his wife of more than 40 years, Carla Blank, the acclaimed author, choreographer, and director.[12] His archives are located in Special Collections at the University of Delaware in Newark. Ishmael Reed made an appearance as a plenary speaker at the 2008 &NOW Festival, which took place at Chapman University.[13] Reed's author-maintained website appears at www.ishmaelreed.org.
Published works
Reed's published works include his ten novels:- The Free-Lance Pallbearers (1967)
- Yellow Back Radio Broke-Down (1969)
- Mumbo Jumbo (1972)
- The Last Days of Louisiana Red (1974)
- Flight to Canada (1976)
- The Terrible Twos (1982)
- Reckless Eyeballing (1986)
- The Terrible Threes (1989)
- Japanese By Spring (1993)
- Juice! (2011)
He has also edited thirteen anthologies, the most recent of which is POW WOW, Charting the Fault Lines in the American Experience—Short Fiction from Then to Now (2009), a collection of the work of 63 writers, co-edited with Carla Blank. Spanning over 200 years of American writing, Reed in his "Foreword" calls it "a gathering of voices from the different American tribes." POW WOW is the fiction companion anthology to From Totems to Hip-Hop: A Multicultural Anthology of Poetry Across the Americas, 1900–2002 (2003), in which Reed endorses an open definition of American poetry as an amalgamation, which should include work found in the traditional canon of European-influenced American poetry as well as work by immigrants, hip hop artists, and Native Americans.
The 2013 Signet Classic edition of Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn features a new Afterword by Ishmael Reed.
Since the early 1970s, Ishmael Reed has championed the work of other contemporary writers, founding and serving as editor and publisher of various small presses and journals. His current publishing imprint is Ishmael Reed Publishing Company, and his online literary magazine, Konch, features poetry, essays and fiction.[14] Reed is one of the producers of The Domestic Crusaders, a two-act play about Muslim Pakistani Americans written by his former student, Wajahat Ali.[15] Its first act was performed at the Kennedy Center's Millennium Hall in Washington, D.C., on November 14, 2010, and remains archived on their website.
Honors and awards
Two of his books have been nominated for National Book Awards, and a book of poetry, Conjure, was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. His New and Collected Poems, 1964–2007, received the Commonwealth Club of California's Gold Medal. A poem written in Seattle in 1969, " beware : do not read this poem", has been cited by Gale Research Company as one of the approximately 20 poems that teachers and librarians have identified as the most frequently studied in literature courses. Reed’s novels, poetry and essays have been translated into French, Spanish, Italian, German, Japanese, Hebrew, Hungarian, Dutch, Korean, Chinese and Czech, among other languages. You can view a C-SPAN interview, in which Ishmael Reed discusses his life, work and career, right here. |
In 1998, he also received a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Fellowship award. In 1999, he received a Fred Cody Award from the Bay Area Book Reviewers Association, and was inducted into Chicago State University’s National Literary Hall of Fame of Writers of African Descent. Other awards include a Rene Castillo OTTO Award for Political Theatre (2002); a Phillis Wheatley Award from the Harlem Book Fair (2003); and in 2004, a Robert Kirsch Award, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, besides the D.C. Area Writing Project’s 2nd Annual Exemplary Writer’s Award and the Martin Millennial Writers, Inc. Contribution to Southern Arts Award, in Memphis, Tennessee. A 1972 manifesto inspired a major visual art exhibit, NeoHooDoo: Art for a Forgotten Faith, curated by Franklin Sirmans for The Menil Collection in Houston, where it opened on June 27, 2008, and subsequently traveled to P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center in New York City, and the Miami Art Museum through 2009.
Music
Ishmael Reed’s texts and lyrics have been performed, composed or set to music by Albert Ayler, David Murray, Allen Toussaint, Carman Moore, Taj Mahal, Olu Dara, Lester Bowie, Carla Bley, Steve Swallow, Ravi Coltrane, Leo Nocentelli, Eddie Harris, Anthony Cox, Don Pullen, Billy Bang, Bobby Womack, Milton Cardonna, Omar Sosa, Fernando Saunders, Yosvanni Terry, Jack Bruce, Little Jimmy Scott, Robert Jason, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Mary Wilson of the Supremes, Cassandra Wilson, Gregory Porter and others.Reed has been the central participant in the longest ongoing music/poetry collaboration, known as Conjure projects, produced by Kip Hanrahan on American Clavé: Conjure I (1984) and Conjure II (1988), which were reissued by Rounder Records in 1995; and Conjure Bad Mouth (2005), whose compositions were developed in live Conjure band performances, from 2003 to 2004, including engagements at Paris’ Banlieues Bleues, London’s Barbican, and the Blue Note Café in Tokyo. The Village Voice ranked the 2005 Conjure CD one of four best spoken-word albums released in 2006.
In 2007, Reed made his debut as a jazz pianist and bandleader with For All We Know by The Ishmael Reed Quintet. In 2008, he was honored as Blues Songwriter of the Year from the West Coast Blues Hall of Fame Awards. A David Murray CD released in 2009, The Devil Tried to Kill Me, includes two songs with lyrics by Reed: “Afrika,” sung by Taj Mahal, and the title song performed by SF-based rapper Sista Kee. September 11, 2011, in a Jazz à la Villette concert at the Grande Halle in Paris, the Red Bull Music Academy World Tour premiered three new songs with lyrics by Ishmael Reed, performed by Macy Gray, Tony Allen, members of The Roots, David Murray and his Big Band, Amp Fiddler and Fela! singer/dancers. In 2013, David Murray, with vocalists Macy Gray and Gregory Porter, released the CD, "Be My Monster Love," with three new songs with lyrics by Reed: “Army of the Faithful,” "Hope is a Thing With Feathers," and the title track, "Be My Monster Love."
Before Columbus Foundation
Ishmael Reed is a founder of the Before Columbus Foundation, which since 1980 has annually presented the American Book Awards; the Oakland chapter of PEN; and There City Cinema, an organization that furthers the distribution and discussion of films from throughout the world.Bibliography
Novels
- The Freelance Pallbearers, 1967
- Yellow Back Radio Broke-Down, 1969
- Mumbo Jumbo, 1972
- The Last Days of Louisiana Red, 1974
- Flight to Canada, 1976
- The Terrible Twos, 1982
- Reckless Eyeballing, 1986
- The Terrible Threes, 1989
- Japanese by Spring, 1993
- Juice!, 2011
Poetry, plays, songs and non-fiction
- catechism of d neoamerican hoodoo church, 1969
- 19 Necromancers From Now, 1970
- Cab Calloway Stands in for the Moon or D Hexorcism of Noxon D Awful, 1970
- Neo-HooDoo Manifesto, 1972
- Conjure: Selected Poems, 1963–1970, 1972
- Chattanooga: Poems, 1973
- Califia: The California Poetry, 1978
- Yardbird Lives!, 1978
- A Secretary to the Spirits, illustrated by Betye Saar, 1978
- Shrovetide in Old New Orleans: Essays, 1978
- God Made Alaska for the Indians: Selected Essays, 1982
- CONJURE: Music for the Texts of ISHMAEL REED, American Clave Music, 1984, 1995
- New and Collected Poetry, 1988
- Writing is Fighting: Thirty-Seven Years of Boxing on Paper, 1988
- CONJURE: Cab Calloway Stands In For The Moon, American Clave Music, 1988, 1995
- The Before Columbus Foundation Fiction Anthology, Selections from the American Book Awards 1980–1990, 1991
- Airing Dirty Laundry, 1993
- Conversations with Ishmael Reed, ed. Bruce Dick and Amritjit Singh, 1995
- Oakland Rhapsody, The Secret Soul Of An American Downtown, with photographs by Richard Nagler, 1995
- The HarperCollins Literary Mosaic Series, General Editor of four anthologies edited by Gerald Vizenor, Shawn Wong, Nicolas Kanellos and Al Young, 1995–96
- MultiAmerica, Essays on Cultural Wars and Cultural Peace, 1997
- Gethsemane Park, libretto; Carman Moore, composer (premiere, Berkeley Black Repertory Theater, 1998)
- The Reed Reader, 2000
- Blues City: A Walk in Oakland, 2003
- Another Day at the Front, Dispatches from the Race War, 2003
- From Totems to Hip-Hop: A Multicultural Anthology of Poetry Across the Americas, 1900–2001, 2003
- CONJURE: Bad Mouth, American Clave Music, 2005
- New and Collected Poems, 1964-2006, 2006 (hardcover); New and Collected Poems, 1964-2007, 2007 (paperback)
- Sacred Ground, Justin Time Records, by David Murray and Black Saint Quartet, including Reed's texts for the title song and "The Prophet of Doom," both sung by Cassandra Wilson, 2007
- Mixing It Up: Taking on the Media Bullies and Other Reflections, 2008
- POWWOW, 63 Writers Address the Fault Lines in the American Experience, short fiction anthology edited with Carla Blank, 2009
- Ishmael Reed, THE PLAYS, including Mother Hubbard, Savage Wilds, Hubba City, The Preacher and the Rapper, The C Above C Above High C, and Body Parts, 2009
- The Devil Tried to Kill Me, Justin Time Records, by David Murray and The Gwo Ka Masters, including Reed's texts for "Africa" sung by Taj Mahal and the title song, sung by Sista Kee, 2009
- Barack Obama and the Jim Crow Media: The Return of the “Nigger Breakers”, 2010
- Going Too Far: Essays About America's Nervous Breakdown, 2012
- Be My Monster Love, featuring David Murray with Macy Gray and Gregory Porter, 2013
- Bigger Than Boxing, non-fiction, forthcoming
- The Final Version, a play, premiering at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe in December, 2013
Further reading
- Sami Ludwig, editor. On the Aesthetic Legacy of Ishmael Reed: Contemporary Assessments. Huntington Beach, California: World Parade Books, 2013.
- Sirmans, Franklin, editor. NeoHooDoo, Art for a Forgotten Faith. New Haven and London: The Menil Foundation, Inc., distributed by Yale University Press, 2008. (Includes Sirmans' interview with Reed, pp. 74–81.)
- Nishikawa, Kinohi. "Mumbo Jumbo." The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Multiethnic American Literature. Ed. Emmanuel S. Nelson. 5 vols. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2005. 1552–53.
- Mvuyekure, Pierre-Damien, with a preface by Jerome Klinkowitz. The “Dark Heathenism” of the American Novelist Ishmael Reed, African Voodoo as American Literary Hoodoo. Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, Ltd., 2007.
- Hume. Kathryn. American Dream American Nightmare: Fiction Since 1960. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2000.
- Dick, Bruce Allen, editor with the assistance of Pavel Zemliansky. The Critical Response to Ishmael Reed. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1999. (Includes Dick's 1997 telephone interview with Reed, pp. 228–250.)
- McGee, Patrick. Ishmael Reed and the Ends of Race. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997.
- Ludwig, Sämi. Concrete Language: Intercultural Communication in Maxine Hong Kingston’s “The Woman Warrior” and Ishmael Reed’s “Mumbo Jumbo". Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, Cross Cultural Communication Vol. 2, 1996.
- Joyce, Joyce A. "Falling Through the Minefield of Black Feminist Criticism: Ishmael Reed, A Case in Point," Warriors, Conjurers and Priests: Defining African-centered Literary Criticism. Chicago: Third World Press, 1994.
- Nazareth, Peter. In the Trickster Tradition:The Novels of Andrew Salkey, Francis Ebejer and Ishmael Reed. London: Bogle-L'Ouverture Press, 1994.
- Gates, Henry Louis, Jr. The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.
- Martin, Reginald. Ishmael Reed and the New Black Aesthetic Critics. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1988.
- O'Brien, John, editor. The Review of Contemporary Fiction Volume 4, Number 2, Summer, 1984. "Juan Goytisolo and Ishmael Reed Number". (Includes articles and interviews with Reed by Reginald Martin, Franco La Polla, Jerry H. Bryant, W.C. Bamberger, Joe Weixlmann, Peter Nazareth, James R. Lindroth, Geoffrey Green and Jack Byrne.)
- McConnell, Frank. "Da Hoodoo is Put on America", in A. Robert Lee (ed.), Black Fiction, New Studies in the Afro-American Novel Since 1945. NY: Barnes & Noble Books, 1980.
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