Award-Winning US Poet Nikki Giovanni Dies At 81

Award-winning US poet Nikki Giovanni, who was at the forefront of the Black Arts Movement, died aged 81 after a long battle with cancer, local media reported Tuesday.

Giovanni, one of the most prolific African-American poets, was well-known for her contributions to civil rights, gender, and race issues.

Giovanni, whose most famous poems included ‘ Knoxville, Tennessee ‘ and ‘ Nikki-Rosa’, died following her third cancer diagnosis, the media reported.

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She “died peacefully on December 9, 2024, with her life-long partner, Virginia (Ginney) Fowler, by her side”, her friend and fellow writer Renee Watson said in a statement to CNN.

Poetry critic Kwame Alexander declared to US media, “We will forever be grateful for the unwavering time she gave to us and all of her literary children.

Maya Angelou, James Baldwin, and Audre Lorde were among the writers who spearheaded the Black Arts Movement, which flourished between 1965 and 1974.

Giovanni pushed for Black and civil rights, compared to her long battle with lung cancer, and in her writing, reflected on her early years as a child growing up in Tennessee and Ohio.

“As one of the cultural icons of the Black Arts and Civil Rights Movements, she became friends with Rosa Parks, Aretha Franklin, James Baldwin, Nina Simone, and Muhammad Ali, and inspired generations of students, artists, activists, musicians, scholars and human beings, young and old”, Watson said in her statement.

Giovanni continued to teach creative writing and literature at Virginia Tech, where he won numerous prizes, including the Langston Hughes Award for Distinguished Contributions to the Arts and Letters and the NAACP Image Award.

She was nominated for “The Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection” for the Grammys for Best Spoken Word Album in 2004.

Giovanni wrote, “I wanted to be a writer who dreams, or maybe a dreamer who writes, but I also knew that one book does not make a writer.”

Source: Channels TV