Angelou’s success as a writer cannot be denied, however, it’s important to analyse who influenced her and recognised her creative talent. Manora says that the women in Angelou’s life “influenced the woman Angelou became”. She applied Carl Jung’s theory of the collective unconscious and categorised these women into archetypes or primitive mental images that we have inherited from the earliest human ancestors. These include Angelou's mother Vivian, her grandmother Annie Henderson, and Mrs. Flowers, a neighbour who helped Angelou find her voice again after she was raped. Manora says these three women collaborated to "form a triad which serves as the critical matrix in which the child is nurtured and sustained during her journey through Southern
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When Angelou was living in New York in 1967, her friend Jerry Purcell provided her with a stipend to support her writing. (Gillespie, M. 2008). The following year, cartoonist Jules Feiffer and his wife Judy Feiffer held a dinner party. It is here that Judy realised Maya’s potential for writing autobiographies, saying that she told the best stories at the party. These included stories about “people she’d known, there were stories of adventure she had, they were stories about her career”. She called Robert Loomis and told him “she’s got a book in her of some kind” (Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise, 2016). Following this discovery, Angelou went on to write seven autobiographies about her life stories, with her first one becoming one of Time Magazine’s “100 best and most influential books written in English since 1923”. …show more content…
“I know why the Caged Bird Sings” marked one of the first times that a Black autobiographer could, as Als put it, "write about blackness from the inside, without apology or defense". ( "Maya Angelou: 1929-2014". Poetry Foundation. Poetry Magazine. Retrieved 20 November 2015.)
Through the writing of her autobiography, Angelou became recognized as a respected spokesperson for blacks and women and is still one today.
Angelou found a way to “replicate who and what she was on paper. A lot of writers can’t do that” (Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise, 2016). She was able to take “such known things and put them together in such a way that the reader says “I never thought about it that way before”. Her unique approach to writing cemented her as not only a successful author but also an important representative of black women in literature. The psychology behind her creativity, as demonstrated through Tanja Schweizer’s “The Psychology of Novelty-Seeking, Creativity, and Innovation” (2006), was what made Angelou who she was as well as an inspiration for other
When Angelou was living in New York in 1967, her friend Jerry Purcell provided her with a stipend to support her writing. (Gillespie, M. 2008). The following year, cartoonist Jules Feiffer and his wife Judy Feiffer held a dinner party. It is here that Judy realised Maya’s potential for writing autobiographies, saying that she told the best stories at the party. These included stories about “people she’d known, there were stories of adventure she had, they were stories about her career”. She called Robert Loomis and told him “she’s got a book in her of some kind” (Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise, 2016). Following this discovery, Angelou went on to write seven autobiographies about her life stories, with her first one becoming one of Time Magazine’s “100 best and most influential books written in English since 1923”. …show more content…
“I know why the Caged Bird Sings” marked one of the first times that a Black autobiographer could, as Als put it, "write about blackness from the inside, without apology or defense". ( "Maya Angelou: 1929-2014". Poetry Foundation. Poetry Magazine. Retrieved 20 November 2015.)
Through the writing of her autobiography, Angelou became recognized as a respected spokesperson for blacks and women and is still one today.
Angelou found a way to “replicate who and what she was on paper. A lot of writers can’t do that” (Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise, 2016). She was able to take “such known things and put them together in such a way that the reader says “I never thought about it that way before”. Her unique approach to writing cemented her as not only a successful author but also an important representative of black women in literature. The psychology behind her creativity, as demonstrated through Tanja Schweizer’s “The Psychology of Novelty-Seeking, Creativity, and Innovation” (2006), was what made Angelou who she was as well as an inspiration for other