Literary Birthday – 2 June – Dorothy West

Dorothy West was born on 2 June 1907 and died on 16 August 1998.

Dorothy West Quotes

1. When I was seven, I said to my mother, may I close my door? And she said, yes, but why do you want to close your door? And I said because I want to think. And when I was eleven, I said to my mother, may I lock my door? And she said yes, but why do you want to lock your door? And I said because I want to write.
2. There is no life that does not contribute to history.
3. I’m a writer. I don’t cook and I don’t clean.
4. Identity is not inherent. It is shaped by circumstance and sensitivity and resistance to self-pity.
5. Beauty is but skin deep, ugly to the bone. And when beauty fades away, ugly claims its own.

Dorothy West was an American novelist and short story writer during the time of the Harlem Renaissance. She was one of the few Black women writers to be published in major literary magazines in the 1930s and 1940s. She is best known for her novel, The Living Is Easy. She ‘explored the aspirations and conflicts of middle-class African Americans in many of her works and was one of the last surviving members of the prominent group of black artists, writers, and musicians who flourished in New York City’s Harlem district during the Harlem Renaissance.’ (via) Her final novel, The Wedding was published to acclaim in 1995.

Source for image: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dorothy_West_(1948).png

by Amanda Patterson

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