Dudley Randal Essay, Research Paper

A Different Image

The age

requires this task:

create

a different image;

re-animate

the mask.

Shatter the icons of slavery and fear.

Replace

the leer

of the minstrel’s burnt-cork face

with a proud, serene

and classic bronze of Benin.

Dudley Randall (b. 1914) Born in Washington, D.C., Randall worked during the Depression in the foundry of the Ford Motor Company in Dearborn, Michigan, and then as a carrier and clerk for the U.S. Post Office in Detroit. He served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps (1942–1946), and graduated from Wayne State University (B.A., 1949) and the University of Michigan (M.A.L.S., 1951). He was a librarian at several universities, and founded the Broadside Press in 1965 “so black people could speak to and for their people.” Randall told Negro Digest, “Precision and accuracy are necessary for both white and black writers….’A black aesthetic’ should not be an excuse for sloppy writing.” He urges African American writers to reject what was false in “white” poetry but not to forsake universal concerns in favor of a racial agenda. His works include On Getting a Natural (1969) and A Litany of Friends: New and Selected Poems (1981). He edited The Black Poets (1971), an extensive anthology of poetry, from slave songs to the present.

Other Works: Ballad of Birmingham

Definitions:

Benin – republic in western Africa

Leer – an unpleasantly lustful or malicious look or smile

Serene – calm and untroubled: without worry, stress, or disturbance

Minstrel – blackface entertainer in variety show: one of a group of entertainers who wore blackface makeup and sang and performed in variety shows (a form of entertainment now usually considered racist and highly offensive)