![]() ![]() “One of the brightest lights of our time-a brilliant writer, a fierce friend, and a truly phenomenal woman.” – Barack Obama She did have struggles and she did endure pain, but through her words, her compassion and humour, she overcame her past and became one of the most influential women in modern history. I love this quote – it sums her up perfectly. She answers the question by saying that she felt it was important to tell the truth to young people, to say “you may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated”. There is a great interview on YouTube from the 70s, where she’s asked a question about the format and the vulgarity of her book Gather Together In My Name (in it she speaks about the pain she had to endure when she was 18 and had fallen into prostitution and was “cheek close” to drugs). Yes, her messages were about love, empowerment, acceptance and equality but there was also a rawness, a truthfulness and realness to her life and words – that’s why so many people are still able to connect to them and be inspired by her. It’s hard to wrap this up, to tie my feelings about Maya neatly with a bow. “Maya Angelou was a woman who inspired millions, who celebrated black beauty and encouraged us, as black women, to fully love and embrace ourselves.” Journalists continue to write about her, activists continue to quote her and earlier this year, Google celebrated her life with an animated doodle on its homepage, which featured celebrities reading Still I Rise. Patricia Cumper is a wonderful writer and with Pauline Harris’s direction and lightness of touch, I genuinely think we’ve created something that allows the magic of Maya to shine through.įour years after her death, Maya’s legacy continues to live on. They were moving, funny and entertaining. Everything was spot on: the music, the tone and the acting. I listened to the first few episodes (where Maya is played by the brilliant Indie Gjesdal) before they went live on Monday, and I was blown away. “Yes, her messages were about love, empowerment, acceptance and equality but there was also a rawness, a truthfulness and realness to her life and words”ĭoing radio is always a great experience and in this case, there was an overall feeling during recording that we were all working on something truly special. I wanted to feel like I had done my absolute best. ![]() I wanted to get it right, I wanted to get her right and to honour her in the best way I could. She paved the way, and opened many a door for black women in America and all over the world, and I felt a huge responsibility playing her. At her memorial in 2014, Michelle Obama said: “She taught us that we are each wonderfully made, intricately woven, and put on this Earth for a purpose far greater than we could ever imagine.” Her words were powerful, touching and bold. Maya did not just speak to the black community. She encouraged not just black women, but all of us, to be completely unapologetic and authentic. She said we were enough, that we have always been enough and that we always will be. Maya Angelou was a woman who inspired millions, who celebrated black beauty and encouraged us, as black women, to fully love and embrace ourselves. “Four years after her death, Maya’s legacy continues to live on.” It was during those years that she found Shakespeare and Charles Dickens, amongst others, and her love of words began. She didn’t speak for five years after he died, because she truly believed she had the power to kill someone with her voice. I didn’t know that she had been raped by her mother’s boyfriend when she was just seven years old and that, after telling her brother what had happened, the boyfriend was then murdered. I knew, of course, about her wonderful work – her activism and her presidential endorsements – but I didn’t know that she was born Marguerite Annie Johnson (the name “Maya Angelou” came later when she was dancing in clubs in San Francisco – a stage name, if you like). In truth, before I started my research to play Maya in the BBC Radio 4 autobiographies, I didn’t know just how much she really did live. Oh, and she was also the first African American woman and poet to read at a Presidential Inauguration. She was witty –with a voice that was so deliciously distinctive. She was also an activist, friends with Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, she became the first black female streetcar conductor, worked as a journalist in Egypt and Ghana, received honorary awards and degrees and become the writer and poet we all know today. She was the woman whose books filled my childhood home. I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size Pretty women wonder where my secret lies. ![]()
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