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=Gwendolyn Brooks by Vitoria Berte= Gwendolyn Brooks was born in Topeka, Kansas on June 7, 1917. She moved to Chicago very young, and spent the rest of her life there. During her childhood and her early adolescence her mother, a teacher, encouraged her to write and to develop a special passion for language and learning as Brooks said "I like the concentration, the crush; I like working with language, as others like working with paints and clay, or note" (Brooks). She began to write as young as 11 years old and by the time she was 16 she had written more than 70 poems.

Brooks is mostly known by her poems, but she also wrote children’s books, a novel, and even an autobiography. In her early works she avoided any comments on social injustice, and only talked about the lives of African-Americans. Her first book, A Street in Bronzeville (1945), tells the story of citizens living in Bronzeville, a black district, and their aspirations and disappointments.

For her second book, Annie Allen (1949), Brooks received the Pulitzer Prize, becoming the first African-American writer to receive it. With this achievement she showed how unique and beautiful her writing was. But it wasn’t just the subject explored by Brooks that won attention; her writing style was also very peculiar. Objectivity and a fusion of African-American colloquialism with the formal structures and language of traditional verse characterized her verses. Another interesting characteristic was her subtle humor and irony, what made her work even more enjoyable.

During the 1960’s Brooks became more community oriented. Inspired by the black power movement and poets as LeRoi Jones and Don L. Lee, she started explore the marginality of black life. In the Mecca is one of her first books that actually talks about issues between blacks and whites. With this work she had finally fused poetry with politics.

Brooks as a young girl was rejected by society because of her race, and she found comfort and a way to express herself in her writing. Through her literature she wanted to show how rejection, poverty and social injustice affect people’s lives, especially African-Americans.

Brooks not merely wrote and interpreted the situation of the blacks in American. Gwendolyn Brooks celebrated her race and everything involving it. She wrote about human emotions and reality, and that made her work incredible. When Brooks wrote her books, she didn’t only mentioned social issues; she showed a racial pride she had within her. She explored every detail of racism and poverty, trying to make American people see how wrong it was, and how wrong it is: “Gwendolyn Brooks speaks out of the American consciousness and to the American conscience” (Shucard and Hersh).

Gwendolyn Brooks is now worldly recognized and some critics even call her “big sister” of the new generation of writers. She wrote to anyone who was, and still is willing to know about the black culture and problems faced by black people in the twentieth century, as she said “I write to Black, but actually, for anyone who wants to open the book” (Brooks).

1. “Brooks, Gwendolyn.” Literary Lifelines Vol. 2 Blo-Col. Ed. Nicola Chalton. Danbury: The Diagram Group, 1998. 50-51
 * Annotated Bibliography**

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2. "Brooks, Gwendolyn (1917-)." DISCovering Biography. Online ed. Detroit: Gale, 2003. Student Resource Center - Gold. Gale. Fuquay Varina High School/WCPS/. 22 May. 2008. http://find.galegroup.com/srcx

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3. “Gwendolyn Brooks.” Poetry Criticism Vol. 7. Ed. Drew Kalasky. Detroit: Gale Research Inc., 1994. 51-109

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4. Shucard, Alan R, and Allison Hersh. "Gwendolyn Brooks." DISCovering Authors. Online ed. Detroit: Gale, 2003. Student Resource Center - Gold. Gale. Fuquay Varina High School/WCPS/. 22 May. 2008. http://find.galegroup.com/srcx

The database “Gwendolyn Brooks” by Alan Shucard and Allison Hersh contains mostly information on Brooks’ work and also how important facts on her life that contributed on her work. I will use it to be familiarized with her books and writing