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| Ntozake Shange | |
Playwright, poet and author Ntozake Shange, "whose most acclaimed theater piece is the 1975 Tony Award-nominated play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf," died October 27, the Associated Press reported. She was 70. Shange's play "has been influential to generations of progressive thinkers, from #MeToo architect Tarana Burke to Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage. After learning of Shange's death, Nottage called her 'our warrior poet/dramatist.' "
Her sister Ifa Bayeza, who also is a playwright and theater artist, told the Star Tribune: "Zake was a woman of extravagance and flourish, and she left quickly without suffering. It's a huge loss for the world. I don't think there's a day on the planet when there's not a young woman who discovers herself through the words of my sister."
In addition to 15 plays, Shange published 19 poetry collections, six novels, five children's books and three collections of essays. Her books include Wild Beauty: New and Selected Poems (2017); lost in language & sound: or how i found my way to the arts:essays (2011); Sassafrass, Cypress, and Indigo (1982); Some Sing, Some Cry (with Ifa Bayeza); I Live in Music (1994); and The Sweet Breath of Life: A Poetic Narrative of the African-American Family (2004). Among her many writing honors are the 2017 Langston Hughes Medal for Literature and the 2018 Poetry Society of America's Shelley Memorial Award.
In a tribute published by Essence, Regina R. Robertson wrote: "No matter the genre or the decade, Shange was focused on us. In her writing, she expressed what it means to be, how it feels to be, a Black woman in America. She spoke to us, she spoke for us, and by reading her words, we saw ourselves. She held up a mirror to our beauty and our flaws, as well as to our pain, struggles and strength. And she did so with skill, grace and a quiet power.... Ntozake Shange was a national treasure and we will always speak her name. We will continue to read and be inspired by her words as well. Simply-stated, we loved her--fiercely."