James D. Corrothers

James D. Corrothers was an African American poet, journalist, and minister born in 1869 in Cass County, Michigan, and active until his death in 1917. He worked as a newspaperman in Chicago and later became an ordained minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Corrothers’s early poetry employed dialect, a popular style among black writers of the period, but he eventually abandoned it, believing it reinforced racial stereotypes. His later verse adopted standard English and focused on themes of racial uplift, Christian faith, and the struggle for equality. His collections include 'The Snapping of the Bow' (1901) and 'At the Closed Gate of Justice' (1913), which reflect his evolving artistic and political views. Corrothers was a contemporary of Paul Laurence Dunbar and contributed to the broader tradition of African American literature at the turn of the century.