JeanJean ToomerToomer

Poet during Harlem Renaissance

5 Interesting Life Facts

Jean Toomer lived for 73 years (1894-1967) Each of his maternal grandparents were born

of a Caucasian father. But a "speck of Black makes you Black."

Jean’s mother Nina Toomer named Jean, Nathan Eugene.

Moved to New York in 1906 with his mother and her new husband.

Graduated in 1914 and sought to live as an American.

Accomplishments- Poems He Wrote

1. November Cotton Flower

2. People3. A Certain Man4. Her Lips Are Copper

Wire5. Harvest Song6. The Lost Dancer7. Reapers8. Song of the Son9. Cotton Song

10. Tell Me11. Georgia Dusk12. Conversion13. Unsuspecting14. Evening Song15. A Portrait in Georgia16. Portrait in Georgia17. The M.W.*Also wrote books like:

Wayward and Seeking

A Certain Man  A certain man wishes to be a prince

Of this earth; he also wants to beA saint and master of the being-world.

Conscience cannot exist in the first:The second cannot exist without

conscience.Therefore he, who has enough conscience

To be disturbed but not enough to beCompelled, can neither reject the one

Nor follow the other...-Jean Toomer

People

To those fixed on white,White is white,

To those fixed on black,It is the same,And red is red,Yellow, yellow-

Surely there are such sightsIn the many colored world,

Or in the mind.The strange thing is that

These people never see themselvesOr you, or me.

Are they not in their minds?Are we not in the world?

This is a curious blindnessFor those that are color blind.

What queer beliefsThat men who believe in sights

Disbelieve in seers.

O people, if you but usedYour other eyes

You would see beings Jean Toomer

For M.W.

There is no transcience of twilight inThe beauty of your soft dusk-dimpled face,

No flicker of a slender flame in space,In crucibles, fragility crystalline.

There is no fragrance of the jessamineAbout you, no pathos of some old place

At dusk, that crumbles like moth-eater laceBeneath the touch. Nor has there ever been.

Your love is like the folk-song's flaming riseIn cane-lipped southern people, like their soul

Which burst its bondage in a bold travail;Your voice is like them singing, soft and wise,

Your face, sweetly effulgent of the whole,Inviolate of ways that would feile.

Jean Toomer

InfluencesInfluences

• Jean Toomer, as a boy was forced to change his name from Nathan Eugene.

• Also forced to live with his father (who made him change his name) until his father died.

• His father died while he was very young, leaving him with out a family.

• Jean went to high school and later college for literature. Toomer loved writing at a young age, always writing about his dad and his hard life, alone.

Influential People

Amanda America Dickson (1849-1893)

About Amanda Dickson

Amanda America Dickson was born enslaved. She became one of the wealthiest African Americans in the 19th century. Amanda Dickson’s life revolved around her family who she cared very much for.Amanda Dickson had a hard life, growing up through segregation, and the Jim Crow laws. This influence Jean Toomer to write about her, in his poems and books.

GoalsGoals

Jean Toomer wanted to be a writer. He wanted Jean Toomer wanted to be a writer. He wanted to write about his hard life, about being alone, to write about his hard life, about being alone, raised with no dad.raised with no dad.

Jean wanted to graduate high school and go to Jean wanted to graduate high school and go to college for literature.college for literature.

Jean wanted to write poems and books his Jean wanted to write poems and books his whole life, and he did.whole life, and he did.

ReapersReapers

Reapers is a poems written by Jean Reapers is a poems written by Jean Toomer: Toomer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsslXvik7YE&feature=relatedslXvik7YE&feature=related

This poem talks about his pain, and This poem talks about his pain, and his pain for others, how he knows its his pain for others, how he knows its coming.coming.

Works CitedWorks Cited

http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Multimedia.jsp?id=m-1702Multimedia.jsp?id=m-1702 Pictures Pictures

http://http://www.math.buffalo.edu/~sww/toomer/toowww.math.buffalo.edu/~sww/toomer/toomerbio.htmlmerbio.html Information Information