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F

Fabio, Sarah Webster (1928–1979)
Well known as a gifted teacher throughout north-
ern California and specifically for her pioneering
efforts to establish Black Studies Programs at
Merritt Junior College, where her students in-
cluded many founders of the Black Panther Party,
including Huey P. Newton, and the University of
California at Berkeley, winning her the title of
“the Mother of the Black Studies,” Sarah Webster
Fabio was born January 20, 1928, in Nashville,
Tennessee. A graduate of Fisk University, where
she earned a B.A. degree in English and studied
poetry with ARNA BONTEMPS, and San Francisco
State University, where she earned an M.A. de-
gree in language arts and creative writing, Web-
ster Fabio was participating in the Iowa Writers
Workshop and pursuing a doctorate degree in
American studies and African-American stud-
ies at the University of Iowa, working with the
distinguished scholar DARWIN T. TURNER, at the
time of her death. Webster Fabio also taught Afri-
can-American literature at Oakland College and
Oberlin College. In 1966, she participated in the
First World Festival of Negro Art in Dakar, Sen-
egal, and in 1968 she participated in the Third
Annual Writers Conference at her alma mater,
Fisk University.
As a poet, Webster Fabio placed herself firmly
in the camp of the BLACK ARTS MOVEMENT, declar-
ing, like its architects, who were more often than

not years her junior, that black was indeed beauti-

ful. This is clearly the theme of “Evil Is No Black

Thing,” perhaps her best-known poem, in which

the speaker declares,

Evil is no black thing: black

may be the undertaker’s hearse

and so many of the civil trappings

of death, but not its essence:

the ridersless horse, the armbands/ and

veils of mourning, the grave shine

darkly; but these are the rituals

of the living.

Webster Fabio, who often read and performed

with “Don’t Fight the Feeling,” a live jazz band,

or to the music of John Coltrane or Equinox,

wrapped in African traditional garb from head

to toe, was fiercely committed to black culture,

particularly its language, music, and traditional

religion, mysticism, and magic—hoodoo or juju,

as she called it. Through often intensely autobio-

graphical poems, she sought to bear witness to the

power of each. For example, invoking African tra-

ditional religious beliefs and mythology associated

with New Orleans Voodoo queen Marie Laveaux,

one of Webster Fabio’s speakers declares:

Jezuss

you’ve forgotten