Eight years later, in October 1935, the Gersh-
win production of Porgy and Bessopened at the
Alvin Theatre in New York City. In January 1939
Mamba’s Daughters,Dorothy Heyward’s second col-
laboration with her husband DuBose, opened at the
Empire Theatre. Based on the novel Mamba’s
Daughters: A Novel of Charleston,which DuBose
Heyward published in 1929, the play featured Ethel
Waters. Waters became the first African-American
actress to appear on Broadway in a leading role.
During the Harlem Renaissance, Heyward
also published two novels, Three-a-Day(1930) and
The Pulitzer Prize Murders(1932). She continued
to write for the stage after the Harlem Renais-
sance. She completed South Pacificin 1940 and Set
My People Free,a play based on the Denmark Vesey
slave revolt in South Carolina, in 1948. In addition
to children’s fiction, Heyward started but did not
complete her autobiography, a memoir with the
working title of I Am Too Young.
Bibliography
DuBose and Dorothy Heyward Papers, South Carolina
Historical Society, Charleston.
Hutchisson, James M. DuBose Heyward: A Charleston
Gentleman and the World of Porgy and Bess.Jackson:
University Press of Mississippi, 2000.
Slavick, William H. DuBose Heyward.Boston: Twayne
Publishers, 1981.
Heyward, DuBose (1885–1940)
A southern writer, perhaps best known as the au-
thor of PORGY(1925), the novel that inspired the
musical Porgyand the long-lived GERSHWINpro-
duction Porgy and Bess.DuBose Edwin Heyward
was born in Charleston, South Carolina, to Edwin
and Janie Screven Heyward. He was a descendant
of Judge Thomas Heyward, one of the signers of
the Declaration of Independence. Heyward was
part of the growing contingent of white Harlem
Renaissance–era writers whose works explored
African-American life. His early inspiration to
write local-color narratives may have been his
mother. She, too, wrote short stories about African
Americans and incorporated the Gullah dialect
into her works.
Heyward endured a harrowing childhood,
brought on by the accidental death of his father
and the subsequent precarious financial situation
of his family. He left school at age 14 in order to
work. He survived a bout of polio and went on to
work on the Charleston waterfront. At age 25, he
became a founding partner in a Charleston insur-
ance firm and maintained himself in that business
for nearly two decades. Heyward’s affluence en-
abled him to regain his high social standing and to
explore his love of writing and of the theater.
In the early 1920s, Heyward’s literary career
began to flourish. He joined forces with John Ben-
nett and Hervey Allen, also of Charleston, and
founded the Poetry Society of South Carolina in- Two years later, in 1922, the friends coau-
thored Carolina Chansons,a collection of poems.
Heyward had the opportunity to spend time at the
MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hamp-
shire. It was there that he developed a friendship
with Julia Peterkin and where he met Dorothy
Kuhns, an aspiring playwright and his future wife.
He and Kuhns married in September 1923; their
daughter, Jennifer, was born in 1930.
Heyward’s second book and his first indepen-
dent effort was Skylines and Horizons,a collection of
poems that was published in 1924. A number of
other works followed in quick succession. Having de-
cided to commit wholeheartedly to writing, Heyward
turned his efforts to the first of several works based
on racial issues and on African-American life in
South Carolina. Porgy(1925) is hailed as one of the
first novels by a white author to feature prominently
African Americans. In 1929, he completed Brass An-
kles,his first play and a script about miscegenation.
His novel MAMBA’S DAUGHTERS: A NOVEL OF
CHARLESTONalso appeared in 1929. This was fol-
lowed by the novels Peter Ashley(1932), Lost Morn-
ing(1936), and Star Spangled Virgin(1939).
It was DOROTHYHEYWARDwho developed
her husband’s interest in the theater. Her success-
ful dramatization of his novel resulted in Porgy: A
Play in Four Acts.It was staged in New York City
and in London. It then enjoyed a dynamic re-
emergence as a George and Ira Gershwin opera
production entitled Porgy and Bess(1935). Scholars
regard this work as one of the most influential
meditations on African-American life.
In 1939, Dorothy, a veteran playwright, and
DuBose completed a dramatization of Mamba’s
Daughters.It was staged in 1939 and starred the
236 Heyward, DuBose