Lorde, Audre (1934-1992)
The work of African-American activist and writer Audre Lord was greatly influenced by her lesbianism.
Born on February 18, 1934, in New York City of West Indian parents,
Lorde was educated at Hunter College and Columbia University. On
completing a master's degree in library studies in 1961 at Columbia
University, she initially worked as a librarian in New York.

This
is the fifty-second post in a series highlighting the best gay and
lesbian authors from the 20th century (with a few before and after that
period) who have recorded in fiction, and nonfiction, the history of
gaypeople telling what life is, and was, during an important time of
history.

From
1968 onward, she held various academic positions: first, as a lecturer
in creative writing at City College and in the Education Department at
Herbert H. Lehman College, later as an Associate Professor of English at
John Jay College of Criminal Justice, where she fought for a Black
Studies Department. Lorde also taught English at Hunter College, was a
poet in residence at Tougaloo College, and a visiting lecturer
throughout the United States.

In
1962, she married Edwon Ashley Rollins and had two children, Elizabeth
and Jonathan. Ultimately, the marriage failed. After her divorce from
Rollins in 1970, Lorde began to have long-term relationships with women.
She died in
1992 after a long battle with cancer.

Throughout
her life, Lorde fought for African Americans' rights both as an
activist and as a writer. The political nature of her work is obvious in
essays such as "Apartheid U.S.A" and "I am your Sister," where, while
stressing the need for women to organize across sexualities, she
examines the way that black lesbians are stereotyped by whites as well
as by blacks.

Lorde's lesbianism had a major influence on her
work. Zami: A New Spelling of My Name (1982), considered by the writer
as a "biomythography," a synthesis of history, biography, and mythology,
is a lesbian text.

Lesbianism for Lorde had a broad definition.
While using the term to describe women who have sexual relations with
other women, she expanded its scope to include women whose emotional
connectedness is centered on women regardless of sexual intimacy.
Emotional bonding among women is at the center of Zami. So is the
celebration of women's power and figures of ancestral African mothers.

From
its beginning, the book explores the physical and emotional aspects of
Audre, a black poet, and her relationships with other women--Eudora,
Gennie, Muriel, and Afrekete, among others. Lorde examines the
significance of these relationships to her life as an artist. Rather
than presenting a rupture between the sexual and emotional life of the
black woman poet and her creative work, the text raises the possibility
of integrating both aspects of the life experience.


Permeated
by a strong social and political consciousness, Lorde's work gives
special attention to the dynamics of being a black woman. In "A Woman
Speaks," from The Black Unicorn collection (1978), the poetic voice
states: "I am woman and not white," while in another poem the same voice
identifies being black with a unicorn: "The black unicorn is restless /
the black unicorn is unrelenting / the black unicorn is not free."

"Sisters
in Arms" from Our Dead Behind Us (1986) explores solidarity among black
women, and the theme of the black woman artist, central to all of
Lorde's work, is presented in "To the Poet Who Happens to Be Black and
the Black Poet Who Happens to be a Woman" of Our Dead Behind Us. The
affirmations of her identities as a black woman and a lesbian are
paramount motifs in her work.

In general, the voices in Lorde's
work challenge the conventions and norms of a racist, heterosexist, and
homophobic society and stress the urgency of fighting against
inequality. From her first texts, the poet reiterates her sexual
identity and reaffirms her literary as well as social space. In her
poetry, essays, interviews, and fiction, she articulates a political
discourse that underscores the oppression suffered by black lesbians.

By
inscribing her own experiences and stressing the responsibility of
identifying herself as black and lesbian, Lorde avoids blanket
generalizations and rigid essentialism. Most important, she bespeaks the
specificity of the situation of black lesbians in the United States. By
recognizing that her blackness and her lesbianism were not separate,
she unified both struggles.
Elena M. Martinez
        


Lorde, Audre:
The First Cities (1968).
Cables to Rage (1970).
From a Land Where Other People Live (1973).
New York Head Shop and Museum (1974).
Coal (1976). ISBN 0393044394. OCLC 2074270.
Between Our Selves (1976).
The Black Unicorn (1978, W.W. Norton Publishing). ISBN 0393045080. OCLC 3966122.
The Cancer Journals (1980 Aunt Lute Books).
Kore Press
Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power (1981 Kore Books) Uses of the Erotic. ISBN 9781888553109.
Chosen Poems: Old and New (1982). ISBN 0393015769. OCLC 8114592.
Zami: A New Spelling of My Name (1983, The Crossing Press. )
Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (1984, 2007, The Crossing Press).
Our Dead Behind Us (1986). ISBN 039302329X. OCLC 13870929.
A Burst of Light (1988, Firebrand Books). ISBN 0932379400. OCLC 17619136.
The Marvelous Arithmetics of Distance (1993). ISBN 0393311708. OCLC 38009170.