James Weldon Johnson

James Weldon Johnson was an American poet, novelist, and civil rights leader born in 1871 and died in 1938. He served as a U.S. consul in Venezuela and Nicaragua and later as executive secretary of the NAACP. His poetry often drew on African American folk sermons, spirituals, and oral traditions, employing vernacular language and biblical imagery. His collection 'God's Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse' (1927) is a notable example of this approach. He also wrote the lyrics to 'Lift Every Voice and Sing,' which became widely known as the Black National Anthem. In addition to poetry, he authored the novel 'The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man' and the influential anthology 'The Book of American Negro Poetry.' Johnson was a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance and contributed to the development of African American literature as a distinct tradition.