Festus Claudius McKay (September 15, 1890 – May 22, 1948) was a Jamaican-American writer and poet, and a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance.
Born in Jamaica, McKay first traveled to the United States to attend college, and encountered W.E.B. Du Bois’s The Souls of Black Folk which stimulated McKay’s interest in political involvement. He moved to New York City in 1914 and in 1919 wrote "If We Must Die", one of his best known works, a widely reprinted sonnet responding to the wave of white-on-black race riots and lynchings following the conclusion of the First World War.
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Fiction, African Americans, Poetry, History, American literature, American poetry, Classic Literature, Union, hanging, short story, African American authors, American Civil War, Confederacy, Drama, Jamaican Americans, Juvenile audience, Social life and customs, United States Civil War, civil war, American Horror tales, American drama, Black people, Blacks, Children's fiction, Confederate States of AmericaPlaces
Jamaica, Alabama, Owl Creek Bridge, United States, Harlem (New York, N.Y.), England, Massachusetts, Andover, Barbados, China, Eastern Europe, Florida, Fountain of Youth, Mallard residence, Massachusetts Bay Colony, Milford meeting house, Missouri, Salem, Salem (Mass.), Soviet Union, kingdom by the sea, France, Marseille (France), N.Y.) Harlem (New York, New EnglandPeople
Peyton Farquhar, Claude McKay (1890-1948), Devil, Ethelred, Madeline Usher, Roderick Usher, Abigail Williams, Amanda Wingfield, Ann Putnam, Annabel Lee, Arthur Miller (1915-), Aylmer, Betty Parris, Brently Mallard, Bridget Bishop, Colonel Killigrew, Dr. Heidegger, Elizabeth, Elizabeth Proctor, Ezekiel Cheever, George Herrick, George Jacobs, Georgiana, Giles Corey, GodTime
1861-65, 19th century, 20th century, 1861-1865, American Civil War, 1692, Civil War, 1861-1865, Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775, 1600s, Civil War, December, To 1964, carnivalID Numbers
- OLID: OL24457A
- ISNI: 0000000108625951
- Library of Congress Names: n79058991
- LibriVox: 1605
- MusicBrainz: a54e0b1d-f5d8-466b-ab22-e42111f1005f
- Project Gutenberg: 53133
- SBN/ICCU (National Library Service of Italy): LO1V042967
- VIAF: 2489725
- Wikidata: Q1096967
- Inventaire.io: wd:Q1096967
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Alternative names
- Claude McKAY
- McKay, Claude, 1890-1948
| July 31, 2025 | Edited by WikidataBot | [sync_author_identifiers_with_wikidata] add wikidata remote identifiers |
| November 9, 2023 | Edited by | merge authors |
| August 29, 2021 | Edited by Jenner | Fill in bio |
| August 29, 2021 | Edited by Jenner | merge authors |
| April 1, 2008 | Created by an anonymous user | initial import |