Mari Evans

Mari Evans
Born	(1919-07-16)July 16, 1919 Toledo, Ohio
Died	March 10, 2017 (aged 97) Indianapolis, Indiana
Occupation(s)	Writer, poet, teacher

Mari Evans (July 16, 1919 – March 10, 2017) was an African-American poet. In 1984 she edited one of the first critical books devoted to the work of black women writers, called Black Women Writers (1950–1980): A Critical Evaluation. Evans died at the age of 97 in Indianapolis, Indiana, on March 10, 2017.

Education and teaching career

Born in Toledo, Ohio, Evans was 10 years old when her mother died, and she was subsequently encouraged in her writing by her father, as she recalls in her essay "My Father's Passage" (1984). She attended local public schools before going on to the University of Toledo, where she majored in fashion design in 1939, though left without a degree. She began a series of teaching appointments in American universities in 1969. During 1969–70, she served as writer in residence at Indiana University-Purdue, where she taught courses in African-American Literature. The next year, she accepted a position as writer in residence at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. From 1968 to 1973, she produced, wrote and directed the television program The Black Experience for WTTV in Indianapolis. She received an honorary degree from Marian College in 1975. Evans continued her teaching career at Purdue (1978–80), at Washington University in Saint Louis (1980), at Cornell University (1981–85), and the State University of New York at Albany (1985–86).

Writing

Mari Evans wrote poetry, short fiction stories, children’s books, and theater pieces. She was the editor of Black Women Writers (1950–1980): A Critical Evaluation (Anchor/Doubleday, 1984), a groundbreaking work at that time.

Although her first and most renowned book of poetry, I am a Black Woman, was published in 1970, many of her poems preceded the Black Arts Movement by about 10–15 years, while coinciding with the Black Arts poets' message of Black cultural, psychological, and economical liberation; however, Evans did not fully align her writing with the movement. In her poem "I am a Black Woman", the second stanza reads: “I am a black woman tall as a cypress strong beyond all definition still defying place and time and circumstance assailed impervious indestructible.” Evans spoke of the need to make Blackness both beautiful and powerful.

One of her best-known poems is "When In Rome", which has been taught in many high schools and college English classes over the years. The poem ends, "I'm tired of eatin' what they eats in Rome." The last line provides the poem with its famous title. It is a dialogue poem, between Mattie and her possible slave owner, offering her unfamiliar foods in the pantry. She is also well known for the line: "I have never been contained except I made the prison."

Community service

Mari Evans was an activist for prison reform, and was against corporal punishment. She worked with theater groups and local community organizations.

Selected bibliography

Poetry

• Night Star 1973–1978 (1981) ISBN 9780934934077, OCLC 6791209
• Where is all the Music (1968) OCLC 119992
• A Dark and Splendid Mass, Harlem River Press (1992) ISBN 9780863163135, OCLC 702366001
• I am a Black Woman (1970) ISBN 9780863163142, OCLC 232624035
• Continuum, Black Classic Press (2007) ISBN 9781933491165, OCLC 940364042

Children's books

• Dear Corinne, Tell Somebody! Love, Annie: A book about secrets (1999) ISBN 9780940975811, OCLC 248502909
• Jim Flying High (1979) ISBN 9780385141307, OCLC 4593207
• J.D. (1973) ISBN 9780380003488, OCLC 2573915
• Singing Black: Alternative Nursery Rhymes for Children (1998) ISBN 9780940975804, OCLC 39254707
• Rap Stories (1974)

Theatre pieces

• Eyes, a musical based on Their Eyes Were Watching God (1979)
• River of My Song (1977)
• Portrait of a Man (1979)
• Boochie (1979)
• The Pro (1979)

Non-fiction

• Black Women Writers: Arguments and Interviews, London: Pluto Press, ISBN 9780745300184, OCLC 18799981
• Clarity as Concept: a poet's perspective : a collection of essays, Chicago: Third World Press, 2006. ISBN 9780883782316, OCLC 238628840

Awards and honors

• John Hay Whitney Fellow, 1965–66
• Woodrow Wilson Foundation Grant, 1968
• Indiana University Writers Conference Award, 1970
• First Annual Poetry Award, Black Academy of Arts and Letters, 1970
• Copeland Fellow, Amherst College, 1980
• National Endowment for the Arts grant, 1981–82
• Featured on Ugandan postage stamp, 1997
• Nominated for a Grammy Award for her liner notes to The Long Road Back to Freedom: An Anthology of Black Music, 2002
• African American Legacy Project of Northwest Ohio Legend Honoree, 2007
• Indianapolis Public Library Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award, 2015
• Mural of Mari Evans by Michael "Alkemi" Jordan, August 2016

External links

• "Mari Evans", California Newsreel
• "Mari Evans" at Answers.com
• Kyle Long, "A conversation with Mari Evans", NUVO, October 6, 2015.
• "A Mural of Mari Evans". Vimeo