angelou

BY T. KEVIN WALKERTHE CHRONICLE

Her body of work – which includes six best-sellingautobiographies and some of the world’s most lovedpoems – will live forever; but Maya Angelouknows that she will not.“Every day I think of my own mortality,”

the renowned writer said recently via tele-phone from her home in Winston-Salem.“Anytime from now, I might say goodbyeto this experience called life.”There was a time, she con-

cedes, when such thoughts nevercrossed her mind – a time whenshe believed that her youth pre-sented nothing but ceaselessopportunities.“I thought I had (immor-

tality) early on, and mostyoung people think theyhave it,” she said.But she is no longer

the long and lean, 20-something dancer thatcharmed audiences fromNew York City to Europe,nor the 30-ish revolu-tionary who zealouslyjoined the civil rightsstruggle. Angelourecently celebrated her80th birthday.Some fight maturity

with every fiber in theirbeing or begrudge it like atrip to the dentist, butAngelou has welcomed age likea kind and generous houseguest.“I am glad to do it, indeed,” she

said of aging.Not like growing older doesn’t

have its disadvantages. Angeloudescribed, with a chuckle, how it takesher longer to get out of bed each morning.

“Now mind you, the joints do whatthey do,” she said. “The bones will not letyou forget every year. The muscles willbunch up on you in a second.”And when she does finally rise and face the

reflection staring back at her from the bathroommirror, she is presented with another set of chal-lenges.Hair that was there yesterday has either gone gray

or gone away, she said, a laugh is still in her voice, andher jowls and gravity are in a constant tug of war.“I used to look a certain way, and now I look another certain way,”

she said.But she is ever mindful of the blessing of life and always cognizant

that so many of her beloved friends and family members never got thechance to comb gray hairs. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, bothof whom were close friends of Angelou’s, would be just about her agenow had they not been gunned downed when they were both 39.

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80 & S80 & STILLTILL PPHENOMENALHENOMENAL

AP Photo/Press-Register, John David MercerSee Angelou on Page 13

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Winfrey threw a lavish three-day 80thbirthday celebration for Angelou inposh Palm Beach. The talk-show queenhosted similar bashes on Angelou’s70th and 75th birthdays.

But Angelou says every gift shereceives – big or small, birthday or not– is special.

“The handkerchief, which is given to me, or the expensive purse ... they all are about the same. It is the love that counts,” she said. “I have so much love, and I am so grateful for it. But there is an equal commitment, responsibility. So to receive that much love, I must give that much love or more, and I must live a certain kind of life.”

These days, much of her extraordi-nary life is lived right here in Winston-Salem. Work brought Angelou to the Twin City in 1981. She was appointed the very first Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University, a lifetime position. Her classes are among the most sought after at the school. Those lucky enough to get a seat are quickly memorized by Angelou, who in one breath can quote Paul Lawrence Dunbar (one of her favorite poets) and talk-show host Art Linkletter in the next.

She travels the world delivering speeches on college campuses, reciting poetry before world leaders and spend-ing weeks at her Harlem brownstone, but when Angelou announces to friends and loved ones that she is going home, they know what she means.

“This is where I come to relax and where I come to work, and whenever I say I am coming home, I mean I am coming to Winston-Salem,” she said.

She takes pride in being an active resident of the city. During her early years in Winston-Salem, she joined local activists in calling attention to the Darryl Hunt case. Hunt, a black man, spent nearly 20 years in prison, after being convicted of raping and killing a white woman. DNA eventually won him

AP PhotoMaya Angelou speaks at the funeral of her friend, Coretta Scott King.

AP PhotoMaya Angelou, pictured here in the 1970s, holds her first book.

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More recently, Angelou was deeply saddened by the death of King’s widow, Coretta Scott King, who passed away Jan. 30, 2006, at age 78.

“So many of my very close and beloved friends and relatives have gone off to what Shakespeare called that, ‘undiscovered country,’” Angelou said.

Angelou sat among four U.S. presi-dents – Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush and President George W. Bush – as she waited her turn to the speak to the 10,000 people who gathered for Mrs. King’s Atlanta funeral. She described to the crowd the special bond she shared with Mrs. King.

“Dr. Martin Luther King was assas-sinated on my birthday. And for over 30 years, Coretta Scott King and I have telephoned or sent cards to each other, or flowers to each other, or met each other somewhere in the world,” Angelou said at the service. “We called ourselves ‘chosen sisters,’ and when we traveled to South Africa or to the Caribbean, or when she came to visit me in North Carolina or in New York, we sat into the late evening hours, call-ing each other ‘girl.’ It’s a black woman thing, you know. And even as we reached well into our 70th decade, we still said ‘girl.’”

Angelou attributes her own longevi-ty to God’s good grace and the love she receives and gives to others.

“I think you should work hard, and I think you should play hard, and be dar-ing and be courageous enough to love someone and lots of people, and have enough courage to accept love in return,” Angelou said about her keys to a long life.

Loving and her gift of the spoken and written word have earned Angelou the adoration of millions, including that of many well-known people. She counts talk-show host Oprah Winfrey as one of her closest friends. Earlier this month,

See Angelou on Page 18

“I see them about once a month,”she said of her grandson andgreat-grandchildren. “I would

like to see them every day.”Rosa Johnson Butler, Angelou’s

niece, lives here in Winston-Salem and is often by her aunt’s side. Butler, a Salem College graduate, has just co-authored, “Maya Angelou: A Glorious Celebration,” a book that extols Angelou’s life and work.

Butler is one of the children of Angelou’s brother, Bailey Johnson, whom she made famous in the pages of “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.” Angelou lost her beloved brother in October 1999.

Angelou says when she thinks about the future, she not only ponders the tomorrows of her grandchildren, but of everyone’s children and grandchildren.

She doesn’t like what she sees on the news each night or reads in the morning newspaper. An image of black youths is being presented that is not entirely accurate, she believes.

“I know that is not the only story. They often show us the sensational part of life,” she said. “I know that the poverty and brutality and drugs exist; however, I also know that the largest percentage of my people are just hard-working people trying to get their chil-dren through school and the grits on the table – that is the majority. It is also possible to talk about the good things.”

She is on a college campus, other than Wake Forest’s, nearly every month, speaking honestly and directly to young people. She especially wants to drive home to black youths that the struggles and sacrifices of yesterday were done for their benefit.

“You can’t really know where you are going until you know where you have been,” she said. “You need to know, that not only did people do great things, but they did them for (today’s generation). They did the great things so that they could leave a legacy.”

As for her own legacy? It is still very much a work in progress. Age may have had some effect on Angelou’s bones, but her brilliant mind is ageless. She brags that she “works pretty much every day.” Nowadays that work includes finishing up another book of essays, which her publisher would like on bookshelves by the end of the year. But no one puts a timetable on Maya Angelou – whose name has taken up permanent residence on the best-seller charts.

“When I finish it, it will be fin-ished,” she said bluntly.

She has just completed a poem forthe 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics,although she says she will not attend thegames. Angelou says she is not neces-sarily skipping the Olympics because ofCommunist China’s shoddy human-rights record. She is not going becauseof the “orneriness” of the long airplaneflight.

Angelou also wants to get back intothe director’s chair. She made her fea-ture film directorial debut with 1998’s“Down in the Delta.” Talks are stillongoing for her to direct a screen adap-tation of a novel by the late writer BebeMoore Campbell.

She also plans to take some time thisyear to study at the Unity School ofChristianity, better known as the UnityChurch. Angelou has been a proponentof the church’s holistic Christian prin-ciples for decades and decided sometime ago that in her “80th year of life,”she would travel to Unity Village, Mo.,(the church’s headquarters) to study.

Angelou still has much living to do.That’s why when those thoughts ofdeath sneak up, she almost immediatelytucks them away in the back of hermind.

“It does not come to linger,” shesaid.

She lives by her own advice when itcomes to aging.

“If you have the chance to growolder, do so with some grace and somegratitude.”

WFUBMC PhotoMaya Angelou speaks at a 2005 fundraising concert for the Maya AngelouResearch Center on Minority Health.

File PhotoAngelou’s only child, Guy Johnson.

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his freedom. Angelou has also lent her famous name to local projects and causes.

In 1989, the late Larry Leon Hamlin was greatly aided in his effort to start the National Black Theatre Festival after Angelou signed on as a supporter and brought pal Winfrey onboard as well.

She ecstatically gave here OK for Wake Forest University School of Medicine to use her name for its effort to end racial health disparities. The school’s Maya Angelou Research Center on Minority Health is involved in a myriad of educational outreach and research initiatives aimed at African-American, Hispanic and American Indian communities. She also worked with Winston-Salem State University to establish its Maya Angelou Institute for the Improvement of Child and Family Education in 1998.

Over the years, her public appear-ances have become rarer, but Angelou has never let a year pass without giving a local book signing or taking part in a community event or forum. She says she loves meeting her fans and neigh-bors – usually.

“Sometimes I don’t go out as much because some people lose their cour-tesy, and they run up to me, grab my cloths and pull on me and so forth,” she said. “But I ask for it, obviously, because I asked to be successful. So I can’t be angry with people.”

Angelou has had a lot of time to adjust to fame. She has been in the limelight, in some form or another, for most of her life. But she never dreamed that she would be who she is today. The notion that her work would be adored by the masses, never crossed her mind.

“I had no idea,” she said emphatical-ly. “I figured I would be successful because I knew I would work hard, but I thought I would be a successful real estate agent, and I would carry an attaché case and wear matching shoes.”

Her work ethic – which includes writing nearly every day – has garnered her not only fame, but fortune as well; she is grateful for both.

“It is a blessing. I can live very well. I can help a lot of people live well,” she said. “I can be generous in my churches and organizations and with my family and my friends.”

Her blood kin includes her only child – Guy Johnson, a California-based author, whom she has called her “mon-ument in the world.” Also at the center of her heart is her grandson, Colin, who lives in Washington, D.C., and has twice made Angelou a great-grand-mother.

File PhotoAngelou speaks at the Opening NightGala for the 2007 National BlackTheatre Festival. Also pictured isRalph Meadows.

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