(2003). In 1986, Redmond cofounded the Eugene
B. Redmond Writers Club, which is based in East
St. Louis. For nearly two decades, the group has
met regularly for writing workshops and organized
community arts programs. In 1991 Redmond
founded the literary magazine Drumvoices Revue:
A Confluence of Literary, Cultural and Visions Arts,
which has published the works of several estab-
lished poets and hundreds of emerging writers.
Finally, blending his skills as a reporter with his
interests in literary history, Redmond began taking
photographs of fellow writers and cultural work-
ers in the 1970s. Over the past three decades, this
practice has resulted in a collection of more than
60,000 photographs, primarily of African-Ameri-
can writers, creative intellectuals, and political
figures. His collection includes in-depth pictorial
narrative of AMIRI BARAKA, MAYA ANGELOU, SONIA
SANCHEZ, and HAKI MADHUBUTI, to name a few. An
exhibit, Visualizing Black Writers: An Extra-literary
Exhibit from the Eugene B. Redmond Collection, fo-
cusing on Redmond’s photographs was mounted
at Southern Illinois Edwardsville and later at the
University of Ibadan in Nigeria in 2004. His poems
that represent the features of African-American
life, his editorial and critical projects that docu-
ment black literary history, and his extensive col-
lection of photographs place Eugene Redmond as
the chronicler extraordinaire.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Burton, Jennifer, “Redmond, Eugene.” In The Oxford
Companion to African American Literature, edited
by William L. Andrews, Frances Smith Foster, and
Trudier Harris, 623–624. New York: Oxford Uni-
versity Press, 1997.
Onwueme, Tess, “Another African Artist’s Wayward
Thoughts on Eugene Redmond’s Poetry.” In
Dreams Deferred, Dead or Alive: African Perspec-
tives on African-American Writers, edited by Femi
Ojo-Ade, 83–95. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood
Press, 1986, 1996.
Pettis, Joyce, “Eugene B. Redmond,” in Dictionary of
Literary Biography. Vol. 41, Afro-American Poets
since 1955, edited by Trudier Harris and Thad-
ious M. Davis, 274–281. Detroit, Mich.: Gayle Re-
search, 1985.
Howard Rambsy II
Reed, Ishmael (1938– )
Ishmael Reed has written nine novels, four collec-
tions of essays, five plays, and five collections of
poetry. He has also recorded an album of his work,
written a libretto, and cofounded several journals,
foundations, and a publishing company. The life of
this prolific artist began in humble surroundings.
Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, on February 22,
1938, Reed cultivated a love of art and expression
at an early age. He moved to Buffalo, New York,
with his mother, Thelma Coleman, and his step-
father, Bennie Reed in 1942. As a young child he
wrote stories and performed them at school. By
age 14 he was writing a regular jazz column for the
African-American community newspaper, Empire
Star Weekly. Reed graduated from high school in
1956 and started attending Millard Filmore Col-
lege before transferring to the University at Buf-
falo. Though he never completed a degree, Reed
has since received an honorary doctorate from the
State University of New York at Buffalo.
By 1960, Reed had dropped out of college and
married Priscilla Thompson, with whom he had
a daughter, Timothy Brett, who was born in the
same year. During the early 1960s, Reed developed
his craft, worked for Umbra magazine, and inter-
viewed thinkers and artists, among them MALCOLM
X. Reed’s involvement with Umbra exposed him to
some of the most influential writers of the BLACK
ARTS MOVEMENT, a group he would later criticize in
his fiction and essays. In 1963 Reed separated from
his wife. They divorced in 1970, and Reed later
married dancer and choreographer Carla Blank.
By 1967 Reed had moved on to Berkeley, Califor-
nia, and published his first novel, Free-Lance Pall-
bearers. Reed began teaching at the University of
California, Berkeley. He was denied tenure there in
1977 (the same year his daughter, Tennessee, was
born). He has since taught at Yale, Harvard, Dart-
mouth, Columbia, University of Washington, and
State University of New York–Buffalo.
During his career, Reed has both garnered
praise and courted controversy. One of the few
African-American satirists, Reed’s postmodern,
complex style and uncompromising dedication to
literary, political, and cultural freedom, has earned
him as many detractors as fans. He has steadfastly
fought to speak his mind in the manner that suits432 Reed, Ishmael