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Kamarck, Edward (ed.) / Arts in society: the arts and the black revolution
(1968)
Artist in an age of revolution: a symposium, pp. [219]-[243]
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Page 220
220 As a schoolboy, I began leaning toward the former, perhaps partly in protest against the bad deal Negroes received from the latter in books, movies and other media, and the pull away from white orthodoxies grew stronger as I grew. Ever since I began to write professionally, I have been strongly committed to this source of strength and power. Does this sp'it necessarily imply an irreconcilable option or is there a tenable position which lies somewhere between? We are all influenced by the traditions of the language we use as well as by the educational environment to which we were exposed, and my exposure to "white" culture was complete. I was always the only Negro in my class, but I heard and read enough to convince me that there was a sense in which I would have to stand alone in the cultural area. When I went to Harlem in the twenties, I felt lei-loose, like a rabbit in a briar patch. I turned my back on much of my "learning" without the slightest regret, and there my re-education began. Do you think there is a special relationship that the Negro artist has to American society? Yes. He must try to change it. Do you think the Negro artist has any degree of responsibility to commit his art to fight for Negro equality? If so, in what way? I get a cue from Frederick Douglass who said during abolitionist times, 'Let every man fight slavery in the way he can do it best." Or something like that. All a sincere Negro artist needs to do is to be himself. If he is honest, and a good artist, his work will certainly contribute to the good fight. Anyone who is wise enough to tell a writer how he should write would do well to write himself. And any writer who is silly enough to listen will not have our respect very long. Does the Negro artist have something to offer that no other artist has? I believe so. Music offers a good indication. There is such a thing as a Negro style, born in the Negro experience in the new world. You can put your finger on it if you catch it early, but often it is so quickly imitated you forget its origin. But there is more originality where that came from, more unique ways of looking, reacting, expressing his view, his experience of life. No other artist can duplicate it unless he is willing to drink from the same cup. To what degree and in what manner can a successful Negro artist use his success as a weapon or resource to improve the status of the Negro artist in society? That is less important, I would say, than what he can do for the society as a whole. The success of Negro poetry, for example, helps to stimulate new interest in and appreciation for poetry in general. The Negro artist will benefit too, of course. Is it a necessary step in the development of an American Negro artist to acknowledge an African heritage? The African heritage of American Negroes is a fact. To deny it or to be ashamed of it would seem to me to put an artist at a great disadvantage. I would hazard the opinion that every upsurge of Negro creativity in this country (and there have been several) has been preceeded
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