April is National Poetry Month! Chicago Public Library's archival collections help you explore poetry history. The Hugh J. Schwartzberg Poetry Collection highlights famous poets and Chicago's role in 20th century poetry history. The Heritage Press Archives focus on poetry by writers of African descent in the second half of the 20th century.
Hugh J. Schwartzberg, a poet and former trustee of the Modern Poetry Association, donated the collection in 1991. The MPA formed in 1941 to support Poetry, the oldest magazine dedicated to poetry in the English-speaking world, founded in Chicago in 1912. MPA evolved into the Poetry Foundation in 2003.
Mr. Schwartzberg's collection includes documents, videos and audio recordings related to the poets published in Poetry. Poems, correspondence, unpublished manuscripts, interviews, readings and other performances from poets such as Marianne Moore, Dana Gioia, Vachel Lindsay, Gwendolyn Brooks, Billy Collins and Yevgeny Yevtushenko. Mr. Schwartzberg also donated a number of signed books of poetry, which can be found, along with the archives, in Special Collections.
Heritage Press operated in London, 1962-1975, and was devoted to publishing poets of African descent. It was founded by Paul Bremen, who donated the material to the Vivian G. Harsh Collection. A goal of Heritage Press was to publish new, young poets, or poets who had never been published before. As a result, it is considered to have launched the careers of Robert Hayden, Audre Lorde and Dolores Kendrick. It also published several members of the Black Arts Movement, including Dudley Randall, who was the American distributor of Heritage Press.
The archives include correspondence, manuscripts, newspaper clippings and photographs related to the poets published by the press, including those mentioned above, Arna Bontemps, Fenton Johnson and others. Also of note is personal correspondence between Paul Bremen and W.E.B. and Shirley Du Bois.
These collections give insight into poetry's history. CPL is also celebrating poetry's present with Poetry Month events across the city.
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