April 25, 2012

Robert Hayden

Robert Hayden

Robert Hayden, a native of Detroit, was a world-renowned poet and the first black to be named consultant in poetry to the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. For more than two decades he taught English and creative writing at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, and at the time of his death was a professor of English at the University of Michigan. He authored more than a dozen books of poetry including American Journal (nominated for the National Book Award in 1978), Angle of Ascent, The Night-Blooming Cereus, Words in the Mourning Time, Heart-Shape in the Dust, Figure of Time and A Ballad of Remembrance (winner of the grand prize at the first World Festival of Negro Arts in Dakar, Senegal, in 1966). A Baha’i for many years, Robert  served for more than a decade as poetry editor of World Order magazine. (Adapted from Baha’i News, April 1990)