April 2, 2003

Contact: Maryemma Graham, English, (785) 864-2557.

KU prof seeks contacts for biography of 'Jubilee' author Margaret Walker

LAWRENCE -- Years ago as a graduate student, Maryemma Graham, now a professor of English at the University of Kansas, forged a friendship with mentor Margaret Walker, the late African-American author whom poet Nikki Giovanni once described as the "most famous person nobody knows."

Walker (1915-1998) began her writing career as a poet in the late 1930s, but she was not cast into the limelight until 1966, when she published her historical novel, "Jubilee," says Graham, who is working on Walker's biography. Graham has edited four books on Walker, the most recent, "Conversations with Margaret Walker," was published last fall.

Graham is seeking people who became acquainted with Walker as she lectured during her career as a poet, writer and teacher -- particularly in African-American communities throughout the United States from the 1940s through the 1990s. "Many have moved and are no longer living in the same communities and may be living with relatives," Graham says.

"When 'Jubilee' first came out, people compared it to 'Gone with the Wind,'" Graham notes. "Jubilee" has been published in six languages and is regarded as the most popular slave novel next to Toni Morrison's "Beloved." Although Walker received calls to make a movie of "Jubilee," none of those options materialized, Graham says.

"Jubilee" was a forerunner of Alex Haley's "Roots." In fact, Walker was one of several authors who sued Haley for plagiarism, Graham says. Although others won suits against Haley for using their material in "Roots," Walker did not. The judge ruled it fair use of the existing copyright laws.

Walker's novel follows two or three generations of a family in slavery through Reconstruction and chronicles the choices they made when freedom came. She based her novel on her great-great-grandmother who was born a slave. As a mulatto, her great-great-grandmother was able to pass for white when necessary to get information for her family, Graham says.

"Mulattos are typically stereotyped in all literature as tragic persons, conflicted about who they are," Graham says. "Unable to resolve the conflict, they usually kill themselves, but not in Walker's book."

In her introduction to "Conversations with Margaret Walker," Graham writes that Walker created and lived by her own standards. "Her passion came from her insatiable curiosity, a belief in Christian humanism, a hatred for irreverence and an uncompromising commitment to social justice."

"Conversations" includes a long and lively 1972 conversation with Giovanni in which Walker argues about the tribulations and triumphs of motherhood, the absence of black women in literature and race relations in America. In another conversation with Marcia Greenlee, Walker explores her family's history and her love of botany and describes herself as "a strange creature with a woman's body, a man's mind in a woman's body."

In several of the conversations, Walker's friendship with black author Richard Wright rises to the forefront. In other conversations with writers and scholars, Walker steers questions about her writing processes to broader issues of African-American culture, family history and the influence of the past on the present.

Although Graham had read Walker's famous poem "For My People," in high school and read "Jubilee" as an undergraduate, it wasn't until Graham had begun her own teaching career that Walker became her mentor. In 1983, when Graham began teaching at the University of Mississippi in Oxford, Walker invited her to visit in Jackson, Miss., where Walker taught at Jackson State University. Over time, Walker asked Graham to work with her on several projects.

As they worked together, "the relationship matured from mentor-mentee into an older scholar transferring her life work to a younger scholar to finish it out. By the time Walker had retired, it was almost like she could start a sentence and I could finish it," Graham says. "In fact it became a challenge for me to know if it was my voice (in text) or hers."

Graham served as editor of two of Walker's later books, "How I Wrote 'Jubilee' and Other Essays on Life and Literature" and "On Being Female, Black and Free: Essays by Margaret Walker, 1932-1992." Graham also edited "Fields Watered with Blood: Critical Essays on Margaret Walker," published in 2001.

In what would be her final visit with Walker in 1998, Graham observed that Walker's battle with cancer had taken its toll. "She could no longer read but could still recite her poems by heart."

Since Walker's death, Graham has sandwiched trips between semesters to the Margaret Walker Alexander National Research Center at Jackson State University to read Walker's personal journals in preparation for writing the biography. Despite a close working relationship that spanned nearly 20 years, Graham says the journals have revealed new facets in Walker's life and perspective. Walker's journals and correspondence have prompted Graham to locate people who formed friendships with Walker.

Anyone who may have known Walker from her lecture tours may contact Graham at the KU Department of English, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045; phone (785) 864-2557; or e-mail megraham@ku.edu.