April 11, 2024 • 25 mins
Pauline Hopkins was a literary pioneer in the science fiction, fantasy, romance, and detective genres. She wrote plenty of short stories, essays, books, and plays.
But as is the case with so many Black women writers from the 19th and early 20th centuries, Hopkins’s work fell into relative obscurity. Thanks to the work of scholars like Dr. Claudia Tate, Dr. Mary Helen Washington, and Ann Allen Shockley, Hopkins is now getting recognition for being the literary pioneer that she was.
There are many more pieces to Pauline’s puzzle that have yet to be found. But the rediscovery of Pauline’s legacy is an ongoing labor of love. In this episode, Yves and Katie honor the life and work of the legendary author and editor Pauline Hopkins.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
On theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
You are as possible, and.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
The iron heel of oppression is everywhere. It has reached
every section of this country, and every black citizen has
a duty to perform. Cultured men and women of color
and convention assembled sit in silence while one side of
this burning question is discussed, the white side, and we
are solemnly impressed with the magnitude of our wickedness and
(00:49):
hopeless depravity by partisan white and colored speakers. It has
reached the past where the educated black will handle any
subject in his assemblies. But Politics South and its friends
have said, not a word of complaint, no talk of lynching,
not an offensive word, or it will go hard with you,
and the race leaders have bowed to that decree an
(01:10):
abject submission. What are we going to do about it?
Stick to principle?
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Katie?
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Do you have a guest as to when that quote
I just read was written?
Speaker 3 (01:21):
Based on the subject matter, it could have been written
today based on how it's written, I can tell you
know what is not an Instagram.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Post fair very fair well.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
It was self published in nineteen oh five, but definitely
the subtitle of the pamphlet that this quote comes from
is super long, but in short, it's titled A Primer
of Facts. This part and other parts of that study
feel like they could have been plucked from the present
and is by our Woman of the Hour, I'm Katie
(01:54):
and I'm Eves today's episode Rediscovering the Pauline Hopkins. Katie,
I love stories about black writers whose legacies were buried
by time and then unearthed by dedicated scholars.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
You know I do too. There's so much promise and
possibility in the fact that there have been and will
be more Black writers whose work will be given new life.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
And we are better for it.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
We're also fortunate because a lot of the time that
work is lost, and a lot of Pauline Hopkins's work
and words survive. But sadly, Pauline died tragically after being
injured in a fire. But she was seventy one when
she died, so she got to live a life that
was pretty full of artistic exploration. She acted, sang, and
(02:41):
she wrote plays, short stories and novels. She was also
an editor for the Colored American Magazine, which was, by
its own definition and illustrated monthly devoted to literature science, music, art, religion, facts, fiction,
and traditions of.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
The Negro race. It's a lot earth everything.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And she wrote biographical sketches of famous Black people in
the magazine, and she helped build its connections to Payan
African intellectuals and its interest in global issues.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
And she published some short stories and serialized her novels
in the magazine.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Right, yeah, she did plenty of them. Her novels Hagard's Daughter,
a story of Southern cast prejudiced and Winona, a tale
of Negro life in the South and Southwest, and lastly
of One Blood or the Hidden Self were all serialized
in the magazine. And if you can't tell what type
of time she was on by the quote from earlier
or the titles of her novels, Pauline's fiction was about
(03:36):
the struggles that Black Americans had to go through because
of our race. They were about slavery and reconstruction and
division between the North and the South, and they were
about understanding the pain and horror of our past to
move forward as a race and as a country.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Pauline was clearly prolific and a woman of many gifts.
Would you say her work put her squarely in the
camp of literary pioneers.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Yeah, I think so. She did her fair share of
trailblazing when she was in her twenties. In the eighteen seventies,
she became the first Black woman to write and star
in her own dramatic work, a musical play called Slave's
Escape or the Underground Railroad. The play was later retitled
Peculiar Sam. Her book Contending Forces, a romance illustrative of
Negro life North and South, was published in October of
(04:20):
nineteen hundred and it was the first twentieth century novel
by a Black American woman. Pauline constantly connected romance and
politics in her fiction. As Lois Brown says in her
two thousand and eight book Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins, Black Daughter
of the Revolution, Pauline quote used sentimental romance to advance
her campaign for racial justice, and the Colored American has
(04:41):
its own fascinating history. It was one of the first,
if not the first, magazine devoted to Black American arts, literature,
and culture in the United States, and Pauline was the
only woman on staff when it launched. And then Take
Hagar's Daughter, which was published serially from nineteen oh one
to nineteen oh two. It made her the first known
Blackmai woman to publish a work of detective fiction. It
(05:03):
also made her the creator of the first known Black
American female detective. All of Pauline's fiction, nonfiction, and editorial
work with the magazine helped grow her status and recognition
in black literary and activist circles. Her work did get
some criticism, though more on that After the Break, some
(05:29):
people considered Pauline an agitator. They were critical of the
candidness with which she talked about taboo subjects like sexual violence,
of her frank condemnation of practices like lynching and imperialism,
her clarity in linking issues of race with issues of class,
and her refusal to mince words in her expression. There
(05:50):
were folks who were not a fan of how defiant
and outspoken she was in her mission to uplift the race,
and on the other side of the coin, some of
our faith eves flamed her.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
We love to see some hate, don't we?
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Poet Gwendolyn Brooks, Okay, she has some choice words about
Pauline and the afterward. To the nineteen seventy eight reprint
of Contending Forces, Brooks says this often doth the brainwashed
slave revere the modes and idolatries of the master, and
Pauline Hopkins consistently proves herself a continuing slave despite little
(06:29):
bursts of righteous heat throughout Contending Forces.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Oh my gosh, she ate her.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
It really is to call someone.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
A slave, continuing slave.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
They weren't that far away from times of slavery either.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
Wait what what I'm trying to think? What year was that?
Did she write continu.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Oh no, this this, she didn't write. Contending Forces came
out in the early nineteen hundreds.
Speaker 3 (06:53):
And then this was a reprint. Yes, this is an
afterward to their reprint. Because Pauline Hopkins herself when she
was alive, wasn't it wasn't that far away? She wrote
in afterwards of her.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Book, isn't that Yes, says that, yes, that's crazy, that
it's shady.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
But it feels like it's a backwards compliment in a way,
because well, no, it's not a backwards compliment. I meant
that the other way around. It's a criticism first, and
then she tries to tackle on a little bit of
the compliment where at the end, where she says, despite
little bursts of righteous heat, girl, it's shady though, you
(07:30):
know it's shady.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
No, somebody did that to me, I literally writes out
of my grave.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
Yeah, well, let.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
It be known to all people who have plans of
flaming Katie in the future after her books come out.
Speaker 3 (07:42):
No, because whoever is in charge of her estate was
like they approve that.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Yeah, to be fair, I don't know who's or has
been in charge of her estate, so I'm not sure
how tight they were about like making sure that everything
goes out is buttoned.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
Up clearly, not at all?
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Right, And sometimes Pauline did use a pen name so
she didn't have to catch all of that heat. Two
pseudonyms she used repeatedly were Sarah A. Allen, her mother's name,
and Jay Shirley Shadrag Shadrag Menkins was the name of
a man who escaped slavery, was captured under the Fugitive
Slave Law, and was later freed by black folks. His
(08:19):
story was a well known one in Boston, and Hopkins
once wrote about him in a profile of abolitionist Lewis Hayden.
In cases where she wrote about touchy subjects like interracial marriage,
Theodore Roosevelt's presidency, and the moral ills of white society.
She chose to use one of her pen names, but
it wasn't always about dodging the ire of benefactors and
(08:40):
people who had more conventional opinions. Sometimes using a pseudonym
meant that she could squeeze more of her work into one.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
Issue of The Colored American. Why are you laughing?
Speaker 3 (08:51):
I love a innovative queen. She's practical, right, she was like, Yes,
Sarah A. Allen wrote this, Jare she's drag and probably Hopkins.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Yeah, all three different women. I know. I do love that.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
I think that that wasn't an uncommon thing to do
at the time, you know, But I think it's funny because.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
It allowed her to write more.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
But it also makes me wonder, like, were there not
other people that could write for the magazine, that could
like have stuff that would be good as well to
be placed in it.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
They're definitely worried, but it's probably much harder to get
to people in the early nineteen hundreds. I imagine even
the literacy rate was probably very low.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, that's fair.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
So she did what she had to do. She put
the whole magazine on her back.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
Indeed, and in general, pen names were common in the
early nineteen hundreds, so they were often used in the
Colored American even by people outside of Pauline, and in
other black publications as well. Authors would hide behind different
identities if they had recognizable names, were divulging personal information
in their writing, or if they wanted to fill out
(09:58):
the response to their writing before publishing their own name
on it.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
That's fair too, you know. I feel like I wish
we had the leeway to do stuff like this. What
you mean you think so?
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Yeah, I guess so, because you can really publish anywhere
and self published so easily these days. They'll find out
who it was, though, the people.
Speaker 3 (10:16):
Will you know that book Autobiography of ex color Man. Yeah,
so James wald and Johnson wrote it, but he made
it like it was a true autobiography when it's really
a novel and was like, oh yeah, like I didn't
write that it was this man's story. But of course
people found him out. But I like people were just
(10:38):
like just silly, goofy mood.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Good.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Yeah, like this is performance art as well.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
The thing about Pauline's work, though, is that it was
sometimes fun and fantastical. There was romance, science fiction, mystery,
and supernatural elements. Of One Blood, for instance, has been
called an afro futurist novel. It's about a midst race
medical student who travels to a magically hidden city in
northeastern Africa. It's got ghosts, secret treasures, racial passing, murder, revenge,
(11:12):
and incest. Now, it wouldn't be seen as that risk
a by modern standards, but I mean on paper, it's
sounding like a fantasy drama that any of the major TV.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Networks would compete for.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Pauline left behind a lot of evidence of her ideology
and working life, and a lot less about her personal life.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
And unfortunately, her.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Story follows the trajectory that a lot of nineteenth and
twentieth century Black intellectuals do. Researchers and historians have pieced
together the chronology of her life over the last several decades,
bringing it back to light after it fell into the
shadows of literary history.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
This is why I love digging through the archives. There's
so much treasure in there, so many hidden stories that
we should be documenting, repeating and cherity.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
And some of the good folks who did that were
folks like doctor Claudia Tate, doctor Mary Helen Washington, and
Fisk University, a librarian and scholar, and Alan Shockley. She
wrote the nineteen seventy two essay Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins, a
biographical Excursion into Obscurity. Now there are a ton of essays, articles,
(12:17):
and other scholarship on Pauline's life. Pauline's book Contending Forces
was reprinted in nineteen seventy eight as part of the
Southern Illinois University Presses Lost American Fiction Series, and in
nineteen eighty eight her writing was included in an Oxford
University Press in Schoenberg Library series on nineteenth century Black
women Writers that was edited by Henry Lewis Gates Junior.
(12:39):
And then there is the Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins Society, which
celebrates her life, work and legacy through publications, conferences, and
programs that they put together.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
And on top of.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
All that, her novels of One Blood and Haygard's Daughter
were reissued in twenty twenty. Pauline worked on a couple
of issues of a new black publication called New Era
Magazine in nineteen six, but that magazine went busted pretty quickly,
and information about her life and work after that year
is available, but it's not as robust as it is
for prior years. You'd be excited to know, though Katie
(13:12):
as a lover of hating and all things contentious, that
there is a potential beef in her story.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Ooh, let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
I got you after the break.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
So, as you know, Katie, black folks had different ideas
about what black people needed to do to progress in
the US, and Pauline was about denouncing white folks for
anti black violence and demanding rights, especially voting rights. Do
you remember that pamphlet I quoted a primer of facts. Well,
its last sentence is never give up the ballot. So yeah,
(13:53):
she wasn't really about being conciliatory and conservative. Her writing
in the Colored American magazine was often anti c coommodationist.
It's what we may call today hot takes that could
upset the whites because a significant chunk of their readership
was white. But as the magazine went through financial struggles
and leadership changes, Pauline was asked to tone it down.
(14:15):
Pauline said this in a nineteen oh five letter to
William Monroe Trotter, the editor of The Boston Guardian. He
told me there must not be a word on lynching,
no mention of our wrongs as a race, nothing that
would be offensive to the South. The he she was
referring to was John Freund, the magazine's white patron, who
wanted to silence the progressive civil rights sentiments that Hopkins
(14:37):
championed in the magazine.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Sounds familiar. It's a lot like the patron in Zorn
neil Herson's story some drama that we talked about in
our previous episode, which twenty of y'all want beef. But
with this guy, I'm struck because, like magazines are more
non fiction based, and so he's literally trying to like
take out a big part of history, like no talk
on lynching. Yeah, well heart lichings are happening, so you
(15:02):
just want that removed from the historical record.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
It's like this magazine is about art, religion, everything that's
happening with black people, and that is included, whether or
not you like it.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
Yeah, and that's a big part of what's going on.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Yeah, and the people are not fooled by this. It
also seems like a herculean task. The people who are
reading this magazine were already used to the kind of
work they were putting out, which means they already wrote
a certain way.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
And they're aware of what's going on. Yeah, you get
trick this right.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
They were tinting their fingers like like, hmmm, I have
an idea.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Yeah, it's quite silly.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
Yes it was.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
So it's not exactly a beef because she doesn't call
out Booker T. Washington by name or even confront him
face to face or letter to letter, but in her
work she indirectly and directly challenged his approach to racial progress,
which called for self help and vocational education while denouncing agitation.
With help from Booker T. Washington, Fred R. Moore purchased
(16:01):
the Colored American magazine in nineteen oh four, and the
content took a turn toward business.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Rather than literature and culture.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
So basically it worked and the magazine became way less
politically risky. Within months of Washington taking over, Pauline was
forced out under circumstances that scholars have since speculated about.
An announcement in the November nineteen oh four issue said
that Pauline quit the magazine because of ill health and
moved back home to Boston, but the announcement was definitely
(16:31):
giving pr statement. Here's how they ended it. Miss Hopkins
was a faithful and conscientious worker and did much toward
the building up the magazine. We take this means of
expressing our appreciation of her services and wished for her
a speedy return to complete health. W. E. B. Du
Bois had an essay called The Colored Magazine in America
(16:52):
in the November nineteen twelve issue of The Crisis. In it,
he said that folks at the magazine told her she
wasn't conciliatory enough. Some scholars say it was a necessary
dismissal as the magazine's content changed, But anyway it goes,
Pauline definitely didn't put Washington on a pedestal, and she
made that known. And I have to say that I'm
(17:13):
cackling because, by all accounts, once the magazine got less radical,
it also got dry and started tumbling downhill.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
Yeah, I can see that if you have this platform
where you expouse these values, and just because one person
becomes involved and they just want to put all their
like conservative values, like make your own magazine. There's other
conservative people who probably want to hear what you're saying,
but not these people who are used to a different politic.
(17:42):
So I feel like conservatives do that a lot. They
co opt radical things like we have Black lives matter,
then they want to have blue lives matter. You know,
people who are for reproductive justice say like my body,
my choice, and then people who are very anti reproductive
justice but like don't want to take a COVID vaccine
or like my body my chol like maybe get your
own phrase. Black people will say say her name, and
(18:05):
then white people want to say say her name like
no original.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Thought, no, not at all.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
It's like, hm, why is that? Why can't they think?
But it's like, you have your views, so why don't
you just talk about your views in your original way?
But I think what it is is like conservatives and
not really saying this about Booker T. Washington in particular,
but I think conservatives are always like in opposition to
your like freedom and autonomy and your liberation. So anything
(18:35):
in the opposition of that they're they're down for, like
we found your doory six my favorite topic they do.
They don't really like the police, y'all killed the police.
Letting the dad killed the police, then it would have
been blue lives matter. But you mad about something, so
you get the American flag and start stabbing the police
with it. So it's like you don't really care, You're
just you just don't like black people. You just don't
(18:57):
like black people's freedom, you don't like black people being
into literature and science and culture, and so you just
want to take it. I feel like that's the through
line with like a lot of the conservatives like co
opting like radical or like war leftists talking points.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yeah, it's more about the snatching away of the thing
than them having a point to prove on their own.
I mean that's how it's always been. It's like we
take your family, we take all your cultural touch points,
we take your language.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Yeah, and like water it down and then are like
confused why it's not hitting the same.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
Yeah, Like you should have foresaw this.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Alas, and there are many more pieces to Pauline's puzzle
that have yet to be found, but the rediscovery of
her legacy is an ongoing labor of love, and there
are still plenty of people on the job. And like
I said earlier, the thing that I love about Pauline
Hopkins is that so much of what she had to
say rings true today. Take this other quote from a
(19:53):
primer of facts. The propaganda of silence is in full force.
Newspapers and magazines have been subsidized or destroyed. If the
editors fearlessly advocated the cause of humanity, every leading intellect
has been intimidated. While per contrary, a horde of Southern writers, speakers,
and politicians are allowed to fill the air with their
(20:15):
doleful clamor against a proscribed race without a protest. Agitation
by the black is rigidly barred, but the Southern white
is allowed the front of the stage in presenting his
grievances to a sympathetic public. Now that could have been
in today exactly.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Yeah, it feels so precient because she's talking about media too,
and media has changed a lot from her time, But
the same exact thing is still happening. Yes, the same censorship,
trusted sources are still disappearing. Then there's just an attack
in general on journalism. I mean, speaking of conservatives so
frequently say journalism doesn't mean anything today because they don't
(20:54):
like it. So I really appreciate that about Pauline's work.
Like we've talked about before, it's unfortunate that we're still
going through the same things and talking about the same things.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
But I like how much of a balance.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
It feels like it is in Pauline's work and her
editorial work, and also in her novels and how they
were still so fanciful and so imaginative and people were
there was time traveling, there were different kinds of worlds,
you know, and at the same time she was dealing
with issues of race. And yeah, I think that people
(21:29):
should check out some of her novels and her essays
and her short stories too if they get a chance,
because a lot of the Colored American Magazine is online
for you to be able to read her work and
just get an understanding of like how she thought.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
And they can read Sarah A. Allen's work as well.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
They can read Sarah A. Allen's work exactly.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
And now it is time for role credits, a segment
where we give credit to a person, place, or thing
that we encountered during the week eves. Who are what
would you like to give credit to?
Speaker 1 (22:04):
I would like to give credit to the black chefs.
I was having a conversation the other day with this
owner of a restaurant and chef who had a bunch
of free stuff outside of his restaurant.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Because the business had clothes.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Because it's so difficult for so many people to survive.
Now what he had, girl, He had sorrel, He had
gallons of sorrel.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
He had cakes out there.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
He had sweet potatoes, just raw swepotatoes, raw sweet potatoes. Girl,
he has some stuff standing outside, and you know, we
grabbed some stuff and talked to him for a little bit,
but he was talking about downsizing.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I've eaten at that restaurant before, and I just want
to give credit to black chefs because whether they have
restaurants or they're cooking at home. I mean, there are
so many black people that have literally fed me my
entire life, and people who were chefs who didn't have
restaurants but were still like, had amazing recipes and amazing food.
(23:01):
You know, there's just been a part of my life
for forever. And for the people who do have restaurants,
I know that it's a difficult business in general, and
I'm appreciative of the labor of love and the love
that they provide to everything through their hands and their craft.
So that's why I want to give credit to Well.
Speaker 3 (23:17):
Hopefully he gets his downsize spot and can stay.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
Hopefully.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
You don't know what he want to do. I want
to give credit to Miss Mati prim Jon. She is
the owner of Marshall's and Music and bookstore in Jackson, Mississippi.
And I was in Jackson over the weekend and I
just pulled up on her. I didn't tell her I
was coming. I first met her while I was researching
my book, and it was like a cute little spot.
(23:45):
People was in there, like buying books and stuff. Like
it's on this street that's like it used to be
like a bustling downtown in Jackson, but now it's like
pretty much abandoned, with like a couple of businesses still open,
but they've been in the same spot since nineteen thirty eight.
And yeah, So I pulled up on her, and you know,
I told her who I was, and she was like, oh,
(24:05):
you know, and we were talking about the book and stuff,
and then you know, we was headed out because we
about to go back to Atlanta, and she said, well,
I'm going to Montgomery later on. And I was like, oh, okay,
there's like a book there or something. She was like,
I don't know, but I'm celebrating the one year anniversary
of the Montgomery Brawl. No, Katie, No, I was like, oh,
(24:28):
She's like, yeah, a group of us are going to
commemorate the brawl. I was like, you play all day,
but y'all have fun.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
They probably have matchave shirts. It was I hope they do.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
I hope they have a shirt with like a silhouette
of that man with the holding chair. I sure do,
and I would purchase one. It's a historical moment.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
We're gonna that's our next episode. Actually, stay tuned everyone,
and we.
Speaker 3 (24:54):
Will see you next week. Bye.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
This episode was written by Eves Jeffco and Katie Mitchell.
It was edited and produced by Tari Harrison. Follow us
on Instagram at on Themeshow. You can also send us
an email at hello at on Theme dot show. Head
to on Themet Show to check out the show notes
(25:21):
for episodes. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
On theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
You are as possible, and.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
The iron heel of oppression is everywhere. It has reached
every section of this country, and every black citizen has
a duty to perform. Cultured men and women of color
and convention assembled sit in silence while one side of
this burning question is discussed, the white side, and we
are solemnly impressed with the magnitude of our wickedness and
(00:49):
hopeless depravity by partisan white and colored speakers. It has
reached the past where the educated black will handle any
subject in his assemblies. But Politics South and its friends
have said, not a word of complaint, no talk of lynching,
not an offensive word, or it will go hard with you,
and the race leaders have bowed to that decree an
(01:10):
abject submission. What are we going to do about it?
Stick to principle?
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Katie?
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Do you have a guest as to when that quote
I just read was written?
Speaker 3 (01:21):
Based on the subject matter, it could have been written
today based on how it's written, I can tell you
know what is not an Instagram.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Post fair very fair well.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
It was self published in nineteen oh five, but definitely
the subtitle of the pamphlet that this quote comes from
is super long, but in short, it's titled A Primer
of Facts. This part and other parts of that study
feel like they could have been plucked from the present
and is by our Woman of the Hour, I'm Katie
(01:54):
and I'm Eves today's episode Rediscovering the Pauline Hopkins. Katie,
I love stories about black writers whose legacies were buried
by time and then unearthed by dedicated scholars.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
You know I do too. There's so much promise and
possibility in the fact that there have been and will
be more Black writers whose work will be given new life.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
And we are better for it.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
We're also fortunate because a lot of the time that
work is lost, and a lot of Pauline Hopkins's work
and words survive. But sadly, Pauline died tragically after being
injured in a fire. But she was seventy one when
she died, so she got to live a life that
was pretty full of artistic exploration. She acted, sang, and
(02:41):
she wrote plays, short stories and novels. She was also
an editor for the Colored American Magazine, which was, by
its own definition and illustrated monthly devoted to literature science, music, art, religion, facts, fiction,
and traditions of.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
The Negro race. It's a lot earth everything.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And she wrote biographical sketches of famous Black people in
the magazine, and she helped build its connections to Payan
African intellectuals and its interest in global issues.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
And she published some short stories and serialized her novels
in the magazine.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Right, yeah, she did plenty of them. Her novels Hagard's Daughter,
a story of Southern cast prejudiced and Winona, a tale
of Negro life in the South and Southwest, and lastly
of One Blood or the Hidden Self were all serialized
in the magazine. And if you can't tell what type
of time she was on by the quote from earlier
or the titles of her novels, Pauline's fiction was about
(03:36):
the struggles that Black Americans had to go through because
of our race. They were about slavery and reconstruction and
division between the North and the South, and they were
about understanding the pain and horror of our past to
move forward as a race and as a country.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Pauline was clearly prolific and a woman of many gifts.
Would you say her work put her squarely in the
camp of literary pioneers.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Yeah, I think so. She did her fair share of
trailblazing when she was in her twenties. In the eighteen seventies,
she became the first Black woman to write and star
in her own dramatic work, a musical play called Slave's
Escape or the Underground Railroad. The play was later retitled
Peculiar Sam. Her book Contending Forces, a romance illustrative of
Negro life North and South, was published in October of
(04:20):
nineteen hundred and it was the first twentieth century novel
by a Black American woman. Pauline constantly connected romance and
politics in her fiction. As Lois Brown says in her
two thousand and eight book Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins, Black Daughter
of the Revolution, Pauline quote used sentimental romance to advance
her campaign for racial justice, and the Colored American has
(04:41):
its own fascinating history. It was one of the first,
if not the first, magazine devoted to Black American arts, literature,
and culture in the United States, and Pauline was the
only woman on staff when it launched. And then Take
Hagar's Daughter, which was published serially from nineteen oh one
to nineteen oh two. It made her the first known
Blackmai woman to publish a work of detective fiction. It
(05:03):
also made her the creator of the first known Black
American female detective. All of Pauline's fiction, nonfiction, and editorial
work with the magazine helped grow her status and recognition
in black literary and activist circles. Her work did get
some criticism, though more on that After the Break, some
(05:29):
people considered Pauline an agitator. They were critical of the
candidness with which she talked about taboo subjects like sexual violence,
of her frank condemnation of practices like lynching and imperialism,
her clarity in linking issues of race with issues of class,
and her refusal to mince words in her expression. There
(05:50):
were folks who were not a fan of how defiant
and outspoken she was in her mission to uplift the race,
and on the other side of the coin, some of
our faith eves flamed her.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
We love to see some hate, don't we?
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Poet Gwendolyn Brooks, Okay, she has some choice words about
Pauline and the afterward. To the nineteen seventy eight reprint
of Contending Forces, Brooks says this often doth the brainwashed
slave revere the modes and idolatries of the master, and
Pauline Hopkins consistently proves herself a continuing slave despite little
(06:29):
bursts of righteous heat throughout Contending Forces.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Oh my gosh, she ate her.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
It really is to call someone.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
A slave, continuing slave.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
They weren't that far away from times of slavery either.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
Wait what what I'm trying to think? What year was that?
Did she write continu.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Oh no, this this, she didn't write. Contending Forces came
out in the early nineteen hundreds.
Speaker 3 (06:53):
And then this was a reprint. Yes, this is an
afterward to their reprint. Because Pauline Hopkins herself when she
was alive, wasn't it wasn't that far away? She wrote
in afterwards of her.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Book, isn't that Yes, says that, yes, that's crazy, that
it's shady.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
But it feels like it's a backwards compliment in a way,
because well, no, it's not a backwards compliment. I meant
that the other way around. It's a criticism first, and
then she tries to tackle on a little bit of
the compliment where at the end, where she says, despite
little bursts of righteous heat, girl, it's shady though, you
(07:30):
know it's shady.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
No, somebody did that to me, I literally writes out
of my grave.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
Yeah, well, let.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
It be known to all people who have plans of
flaming Katie in the future after her books come out.
Speaker 3 (07:42):
No, because whoever is in charge of her estate was
like they approve that.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Yeah, to be fair, I don't know who's or has
been in charge of her estate, so I'm not sure
how tight they were about like making sure that everything
goes out is buttoned.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
Up clearly, not at all?
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Right, And sometimes Pauline did use a pen name so
she didn't have to catch all of that heat. Two
pseudonyms she used repeatedly were Sarah A. Allen, her mother's name,
and Jay Shirley Shadrag Shadrag Menkins was the name of
a man who escaped slavery, was captured under the Fugitive
Slave Law, and was later freed by black folks. His
(08:19):
story was a well known one in Boston, and Hopkins
once wrote about him in a profile of abolitionist Lewis Hayden.
In cases where she wrote about touchy subjects like interracial marriage,
Theodore Roosevelt's presidency, and the moral ills of white society.
She chose to use one of her pen names, but
it wasn't always about dodging the ire of benefactors and
(08:40):
people who had more conventional opinions. Sometimes using a pseudonym
meant that she could squeeze more of her work into one.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
Issue of The Colored American. Why are you laughing?
Speaker 3 (08:51):
I love a innovative queen. She's practical, right, she was like, Yes,
Sarah A. Allen wrote this, Jare she's drag and probably Hopkins.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Yeah, all three different women. I know. I do love that.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
I think that that wasn't an uncommon thing to do
at the time, you know, But I think it's funny because.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
It allowed her to write more.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
But it also makes me wonder, like, were there not
other people that could write for the magazine, that could
like have stuff that would be good as well to
be placed in it.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
They're definitely worried, but it's probably much harder to get
to people in the early nineteen hundreds. I imagine even
the literacy rate was probably very low.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, that's fair.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
So she did what she had to do. She put
the whole magazine on her back.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
Indeed, and in general, pen names were common in the
early nineteen hundreds, so they were often used in the
Colored American even by people outside of Pauline, and in
other black publications as well. Authors would hide behind different
identities if they had recognizable names, were divulging personal information
in their writing, or if they wanted to fill out
(09:58):
the response to their writing before publishing their own name
on it.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
That's fair too, you know. I feel like I wish
we had the leeway to do stuff like this. What
you mean you think so?
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Yeah, I guess so, because you can really publish anywhere
and self published so easily these days. They'll find out
who it was, though, the people.
Speaker 3 (10:16):
Will you know that book Autobiography of ex color Man. Yeah,
so James wald and Johnson wrote it, but he made
it like it was a true autobiography when it's really
a novel and was like, oh yeah, like I didn't
write that it was this man's story. But of course
people found him out. But I like people were just
(10:38):
like just silly, goofy mood.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Good.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Yeah, like this is performance art as well.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
The thing about Pauline's work, though, is that it was
sometimes fun and fantastical. There was romance, science fiction, mystery,
and supernatural elements. Of One Blood, for instance, has been
called an afro futurist novel. It's about a midst race
medical student who travels to a magically hidden city in
northeastern Africa. It's got ghosts, secret treasures, racial passing, murder, revenge,
(11:12):
and incest. Now, it wouldn't be seen as that risk
a by modern standards, but I mean on paper, it's
sounding like a fantasy drama that any of the major TV.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Networks would compete for.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Pauline left behind a lot of evidence of her ideology
and working life, and a lot less about her personal life.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
And unfortunately, her.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Story follows the trajectory that a lot of nineteenth and
twentieth century Black intellectuals do. Researchers and historians have pieced
together the chronology of her life over the last several decades,
bringing it back to light after it fell into the
shadows of literary history.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
This is why I love digging through the archives. There's
so much treasure in there, so many hidden stories that
we should be documenting, repeating and cherity.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
And some of the good folks who did that were
folks like doctor Claudia Tate, doctor Mary Helen Washington, and
Fisk University, a librarian and scholar, and Alan Shockley. She
wrote the nineteen seventy two essay Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins, a
biographical Excursion into Obscurity. Now there are a ton of essays, articles,
(12:17):
and other scholarship on Pauline's life. Pauline's book Contending Forces
was reprinted in nineteen seventy eight as part of the
Southern Illinois University Presses Lost American Fiction Series, and in
nineteen eighty eight her writing was included in an Oxford
University Press in Schoenberg Library series on nineteenth century Black
women Writers that was edited by Henry Lewis Gates Junior.
(12:39):
And then there is the Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins Society, which
celebrates her life, work and legacy through publications, conferences, and
programs that they put together.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
And on top of.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
All that, her novels of One Blood and Haygard's Daughter
were reissued in twenty twenty. Pauline worked on a couple
of issues of a new black publication called New Era
Magazine in nineteen six, but that magazine went busted pretty quickly,
and information about her life and work after that year
is available, but it's not as robust as it is
for prior years. You'd be excited to know, though Katie
(13:12):
as a lover of hating and all things contentious, that
there is a potential beef in her story.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Ooh, let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
I got you after the break.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
So, as you know, Katie, black folks had different ideas
about what black people needed to do to progress in
the US, and Pauline was about denouncing white folks for
anti black violence and demanding rights, especially voting rights. Do
you remember that pamphlet I quoted a primer of facts. Well,
its last sentence is never give up the ballot. So yeah,
(13:53):
she wasn't really about being conciliatory and conservative. Her writing
in the Colored American magazine was often anti c coommodationist.
It's what we may call today hot takes that could
upset the whites because a significant chunk of their readership
was white. But as the magazine went through financial struggles
and leadership changes, Pauline was asked to tone it down.
(14:15):
Pauline said this in a nineteen oh five letter to
William Monroe Trotter, the editor of The Boston Guardian. He
told me there must not be a word on lynching,
no mention of our wrongs as a race, nothing that
would be offensive to the South. The he she was
referring to was John Freund, the magazine's white patron, who
wanted to silence the progressive civil rights sentiments that Hopkins
(14:37):
championed in the magazine.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Sounds familiar. It's a lot like the patron in Zorn
neil Herson's story some drama that we talked about in
our previous episode, which twenty of y'all want beef. But
with this guy, I'm struck because, like magazines are more
non fiction based, and so he's literally trying to like
take out a big part of history, like no talk
on lynching. Yeah, well heart lichings are happening, so you
(15:02):
just want that removed from the historical record.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
It's like this magazine is about art, religion, everything that's
happening with black people, and that is included, whether or
not you like it.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
Yeah, and that's a big part of what's going on.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Yeah, and the people are not fooled by this. It
also seems like a herculean task. The people who are
reading this magazine were already used to the kind of
work they were putting out, which means they already wrote
a certain way.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
And they're aware of what's going on. Yeah, you get
trick this right.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
They were tinting their fingers like like, hmmm, I have
an idea.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Yeah, it's quite silly.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
Yes it was.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
So it's not exactly a beef because she doesn't call
out Booker T. Washington by name or even confront him
face to face or letter to letter, but in her
work she indirectly and directly challenged his approach to racial progress,
which called for self help and vocational education while denouncing agitation.
With help from Booker T. Washington, Fred R. Moore purchased
(16:01):
the Colored American magazine in nineteen oh four, and the
content took a turn toward business.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Rather than literature and culture.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
So basically it worked and the magazine became way less
politically risky. Within months of Washington taking over, Pauline was
forced out under circumstances that scholars have since speculated about.
An announcement in the November nineteen oh four issue said
that Pauline quit the magazine because of ill health and
moved back home to Boston, but the announcement was definitely
(16:31):
giving pr statement. Here's how they ended it. Miss Hopkins
was a faithful and conscientious worker and did much toward
the building up the magazine. We take this means of
expressing our appreciation of her services and wished for her
a speedy return to complete health. W. E. B. Du
Bois had an essay called The Colored Magazine in America
(16:52):
in the November nineteen twelve issue of The Crisis. In it,
he said that folks at the magazine told her she
wasn't conciliatory enough. Some scholars say it was a necessary
dismissal as the magazine's content changed, But anyway it goes,
Pauline definitely didn't put Washington on a pedestal, and she
made that known. And I have to say that I'm
(17:13):
cackling because, by all accounts, once the magazine got less radical,
it also got dry and started tumbling downhill.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
Yeah, I can see that if you have this platform
where you expouse these values, and just because one person
becomes involved and they just want to put all their
like conservative values, like make your own magazine. There's other
conservative people who probably want to hear what you're saying,
but not these people who are used to a different politic.
(17:42):
So I feel like conservatives do that a lot. They
co opt radical things like we have Black lives matter,
then they want to have blue lives matter. You know,
people who are for reproductive justice say like my body,
my choice, and then people who are very anti reproductive
justice but like don't want to take a COVID vaccine
or like my body my chol like maybe get your
own phrase. Black people will say say her name, and
(18:05):
then white people want to say say her name like
no original.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Thought, no, not at all.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
It's like, hm, why is that? Why can't they think?
But it's like, you have your views, so why don't
you just talk about your views in your original way?
But I think what it is is like conservatives and
not really saying this about Booker T. Washington in particular,
but I think conservatives are always like in opposition to
your like freedom and autonomy and your liberation. So anything
(18:35):
in the opposition of that they're they're down for, like
we found your doory six my favorite topic they do.
They don't really like the police, y'all killed the police.
Letting the dad killed the police, then it would have
been blue lives matter. But you mad about something, so
you get the American flag and start stabbing the police
with it. So it's like you don't really care, You're
just you just don't like black people. You just don't
(18:57):
like black people's freedom, you don't like black people being
into literature and science and culture, and so you just
want to take it. I feel like that's the through
line with like a lot of the conservatives like co
opting like radical or like war leftists talking points.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yeah, it's more about the snatching away of the thing
than them having a point to prove on their own.
I mean that's how it's always been. It's like we
take your family, we take all your cultural touch points,
we take your language.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Yeah, and like water it down and then are like
confused why it's not hitting the same.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
Yeah, Like you should have foresaw this.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Alas, and there are many more pieces to Pauline's puzzle
that have yet to be found, but the rediscovery of
her legacy is an ongoing labor of love, and there
are still plenty of people on the job. And like
I said earlier, the thing that I love about Pauline
Hopkins is that so much of what she had to
say rings true today. Take this other quote from a
(19:53):
primer of facts. The propaganda of silence is in full force.
Newspapers and magazines have been subsidized or destroyed. If the
editors fearlessly advocated the cause of humanity, every leading intellect
has been intimidated. While per contrary, a horde of Southern writers, speakers,
and politicians are allowed to fill the air with their
(20:15):
doleful clamor against a proscribed race without a protest. Agitation
by the black is rigidly barred, but the Southern white
is allowed the front of the stage in presenting his
grievances to a sympathetic public. Now that could have been
in today exactly.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Yeah, it feels so precient because she's talking about media too,
and media has changed a lot from her time, But
the same exact thing is still happening. Yes, the same censorship,
trusted sources are still disappearing. Then there's just an attack
in general on journalism. I mean, speaking of conservatives so
frequently say journalism doesn't mean anything today because they don't
(20:54):
like it. So I really appreciate that about Pauline's work.
Like we've talked about before, it's unfortunate that we're still
going through the same things and talking about the same things.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
But I like how much of a balance.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
It feels like it is in Pauline's work and her
editorial work, and also in her novels and how they
were still so fanciful and so imaginative and people were
there was time traveling, there were different kinds of worlds,
you know, and at the same time she was dealing
with issues of race. And yeah, I think that people
(21:29):
should check out some of her novels and her essays
and her short stories too if they get a chance,
because a lot of the Colored American Magazine is online
for you to be able to read her work and
just get an understanding of like how she thought.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
And they can read Sarah A. Allen's work as well.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
They can read Sarah A. Allen's work exactly.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
And now it is time for role credits, a segment
where we give credit to a person, place, or thing
that we encountered during the week eves. Who are what
would you like to give credit to?
Speaker 1 (22:04):
I would like to give credit to the black chefs.
I was having a conversation the other day with this
owner of a restaurant and chef who had a bunch
of free stuff outside of his restaurant.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Because the business had clothes.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Because it's so difficult for so many people to survive.
Now what he had, girl, He had sorrel, He had
gallons of sorrel.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
He had cakes out there.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
He had sweet potatoes, just raw swepotatoes, raw sweet potatoes. Girl,
he has some stuff standing outside, and you know, we
grabbed some stuff and talked to him for a little bit,
but he was talking about downsizing.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I've eaten at that restaurant before, and I just want
to give credit to black chefs because whether they have
restaurants or they're cooking at home. I mean, there are
so many black people that have literally fed me my
entire life, and people who were chefs who didn't have
restaurants but were still like, had amazing recipes and amazing food.
(23:01):
You know, there's just been a part of my life
for forever. And for the people who do have restaurants,
I know that it's a difficult business in general, and
I'm appreciative of the labor of love and the love
that they provide to everything through their hands and their craft.
So that's why I want to give credit to Well.
Speaker 3 (23:17):
Hopefully he gets his downsize spot and can stay.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
Hopefully.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
You don't know what he want to do. I want
to give credit to Miss Mati prim Jon. She is
the owner of Marshall's and Music and bookstore in Jackson, Mississippi.
And I was in Jackson over the weekend and I
just pulled up on her. I didn't tell her I
was coming. I first met her while I was researching
my book, and it was like a cute little spot.
(23:45):
People was in there, like buying books and stuff. Like
it's on this street that's like it used to be
like a bustling downtown in Jackson, but now it's like
pretty much abandoned, with like a couple of businesses still open,
but they've been in the same spot since nineteen thirty eight.
And yeah, So I pulled up on her, and you know,
I told her who I was, and she was like, oh,
(24:05):
you know, and we were talking about the book and stuff,
and then you know, we was headed out because we
about to go back to Atlanta, and she said, well,
I'm going to Montgomery later on. And I was like, oh, okay,
there's like a book there or something. She was like,
I don't know, but I'm celebrating the one year anniversary
of the Montgomery Brawl. No, Katie, No, I was like, oh,
(24:28):
She's like, yeah, a group of us are going to
commemorate the brawl. I was like, you play all day,
but y'all have fun.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
They probably have matchave shirts. It was I hope they do.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
I hope they have a shirt with like a silhouette
of that man with the holding chair. I sure do,
and I would purchase one. It's a historical moment.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
We're gonna that's our next episode. Actually, stay tuned everyone,
and we.
Speaker 3 (24:54):
Will see you next week. Bye.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
This episode was written by Eves Jeffco and Katie Mitchell.
It was edited and produced by Tari Harrison. Follow us
on Instagram at on Themeshow. You can also send us
an email at hello at on Theme dot show. Head
to on Themet Show to check out the show notes
(25:21):
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