The dramatist, novelist and poet, Amiri Baraka is one of the most respected and widely published African-American writers. With the beginning of Black Civil Rights Movements during the sixties, Baraka explored the anger of African-Americans and used his writings as a weapon against racism. Also, he advocated scientific socialism with his revolutionary inclined poems and aimed at creating aesthetic through them.

 

Amiri Baraka’s writing career spans over nearly fifty years and has mostly focused on the subjects of Black Liberation and White Racism. Today, a number of well known poems, short stories, plays and commentaries on society, music and literature are associated with his name. A few of the famous ones include, ‘The Music: Reflection on Jazz and Blues’, ‘The Book of Monk’ and ‘New Music, New Poetry’ among others.

 

The literary world respects the playwright and poet, Amiri Baraka as one of the revolutionary provocateurs of African-American poetry. He is counted among the few influential political activists who have spent most of their life time fighting for the rights of African-Americans.

Amiri Baraka is a well known African-American writer of fiction, drama, poetry and music. With books such as Tales of the Out and the Gone, he has received the PEN Open Book Award and is also respected as one of the most widely published African American authors of his generation. Apart from writing, Baraka is considered as a revolutionary political activist and has given lectures on various political and cultural issues extensively throughout Europe, Africa, USA and the Caribbean.

 

Born in 1934, Amiri Baraka was raised in USA. Having studied Philosophy and Religion at Columbia University, he has a sound knowledge of these subjects that also reflects well in his writings.

Baraka started his professional career by joining the US Air Force in the early fifties.  Destined to be an accomplished author, he did not serve the military for long and switched to a completely different domain by opting to work in a warehouse for music records. This is where his social circle expanded and added the Black Mountain Poets, New York School Poets and the Beat Generation to it. Also, it developed his interest in Jazz music which later matured in making him one of the most sought after music critics.

 

Amiri Baraka for his work has taken influences from a number of musical orishas such as John Coltrane, Malcolm X, Ornette Coleman and Thelonius Monk which got him regarded as the founder of Black Arts Movement in the era of sixties. His study on 'African-American music' and the play ‘Dutchman and Blues People’ is commendable. Also, his published collection of essays, ‘The Essence of Reparations’ and poems like ‘Somebody Blewup America’ added more fame to his name.

 

Today, Amiri Baraka is recognized with a long list of awards and honors that includes the James Weldon Johnson Medal for contributions to the arts, the American Academy of Arts & Letters award, the Poet Laureate of New Jersey and Professor Emeritus at the State university of New York at Stony Brook. He is a prominent figure in the literary world and is included in scholar Molefi Kete Asante’s list of 100 Greatest African Americans.

 

When it comes to African-American music and culture, Amiri Baraka is ranked among the most important commentators of the subject. His exceptional assemblage of writings on music blends the history, autobiography and political opinions to recall the places, times and people he has encountered throughout his life. 
A few of the famous Amiri Baraka books include;

 

Blues People and Black Music - It is one of Baraka’s early classics and narrates essays on famous personalities such as Max Roach, Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Charlie Parker. 
According to Langston Hughes, it is "A must for all who would more knowledgeably appreciate and better comprehendAmerica's most popular music."

 

Somebody Blew up America- This book was published after the 9/11 incident in America and narrates Baraka’s opinions about tragedies that took place in US and other places around the world.
According to Kamau Brathwaite, NYU, it is “One more mark in the development in modern Black radical & revolutionary cultural reconstruction.”

 

Tales of the Out and the Gone- It narrates short fictional stories from the early seventies to the twenty first century and revolves around events, struggles and conditions of the passing time.
As per the magazine, Booklist, “In this book, fans and newcomers alike will appreciate Baraka's breadth of political perspective and passion for storytelling."

 

Amiri Baraka’s list of writings is long and varied.  With regards to music as a subject, be it jazz blues, pop rock oralternative, it helps in realizing the importance of music. Also, it gives the listeners a sense of belonging by extending knowledge from generation to generation.