Research Catalog

Details

Additional authors

1. Feelings, Tom.
2. Angelou, Maya.
3. Clarke, John Henrik, 1915-1998.
4. King, Woodie, Jr., 1937-
5. Nelson, Truman John, 1912-
6. Marshall, William, 1924-
7. Joseph, Gloria I.
8. Gibson, Richard, 1931-
9. Forman, James, 1928-2005.
10. Dee, Ruby.
11. Davis, Ossie.
12. Dassin, Jules, 1911-2008.
13. Windom, Alice.
14. Sinnette, Calvin.
15. Sinnette, Elinor Des Verney.
16. King, Preston T., 1936-
17. Du Bois, David Graham.
18. Branch, William B.
19. Boone, Sylvia Ardyn.
20. Bailey, Herman Kofi.
21. O'Brien, Conor Cruise, 1917-
22. Cordero, Ana Livia.
23. Guy, Rosa.
24. Williams, Robert Franklin, 1925-
25. Cambridge, Joan.

Description

1. 14.4 lin. ft.

Summary

1. The collection documents Julian Mayfield's career as a writer, educator, and actor, and his activities as a political expatriate in West Africa and Guyana. Significant correspondents include fellow African-American expatriates and friends Maya Angelou, Herman Kofi Bailey, Sylvia Boone, William Branch, Tom Feelings, David DuBois, Preston King, Jim Lacy, Calvin and Elinor Sinnette, and Alice Windom. Other correspondents are John Henrik Clarke, Jules Dassin, Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, James Forman, Richard Gibson, Gloria Joseph, Woodie King, Paul Mann, William Marshall, Truman Nelson, and Conor Cruise O'Brien.

Donor/Sponsor

1. Schomburg NEH Archival Resources for the Study of the Post-Civil Rights Movements Project.

Subject

1. African Americans in the performing arts
2. Heads of state > Africa > Biography
3. Burnham, Forbes, 1923-1985
4. African American novelists
5. Henri Christophe, King of Haiti, 1767-1820 > Drama
6. Manuscripts
7. Course outlines
8. Heads of state > Guyana > Biography
9. Nkrumah, Kwame, 1909-1972 > Drama
10. African American motion picture actors and actresses
11. Mallory, Mae
12. Heads of state > Ghana > Biography
13. Cuba
14. Ghana > Politics and government > 1957-1979
15. Black power > United States
16. Guyana > Politics and government > 1966-
17. Fulbright scholars
18. Ghana > History > Coup d'état, 1966
19. African Americans > Intellectual life
20. African Americans in literature
21. Civil rights > North Carolina > Monroe
22. African Americans > Political activity
23. Radio scripts
24. African American authors
25. African Americans > North Carolina > Monroe
26. Haiti > History > Revolution, 1791-1804 > Drama
27. Motion picture plays
28. African American dramatists
29. Du Bois, W. E. B (William Edward Burghardt), 1868-1963 > Criticism and interpretation
30. Howard University
31. Guyana > Ministry of Information and Culture
32. American literature > African American authors
33. Heads of state > Caribbean Area > Biography
34. Black Arts Movement

Genre/Form

1. Manuscripts.
2. Radio scripts.
3. Course outlines.
4. Motion picture plays.

Call number

1. Sc MG 339

Note

1. Photographs transferred to Photographs and Prints Division.

Source (note)

1. Mayfield, Joan Cambridge

Biography (note)

1. Julian Mayfield lived a varied career as a novelist, playwright, actor, journalist and critic, aide to two heads of state, an educator and writer-in-residence at several colleges and universities.

Processing action (note)

1. Accessioned
2. Processed
3. Catalogued

Author

1. Mayfield, Julian, 1928-1984.

Title

1. Julian Mayfield papers, 1949-1984.

Biography

1. Julian Mayfield lived a varied career as a novelist, playwright, actor, journalist and critic, aide to two heads of state, an educator and writer-in-residence at several colleges and universities. He wrote, produced and directed several off-Broadway and summer stock productions between 1949 and 1954. He played the juvenile lead role of Absalom Kumalo in the Kurt Weill-Maxwell Anderson musical "Lost in the Stars," and directed Ossie Davis's first play, "Alice in Wonder," in 1952. Two of Mayfield's plays, "Fire" and "417," were produced off-Broadway and in summer stock. "Fire" was produced in 1949 by the Group 20 Players.
2. Mayfield's first three novels, "The Hit" (1951), "The Long Night" (1958) and "The Grand Parade" (1961), were published by Vanguard Press. He went to live in Ghana in 1961 where he worked as a writer in the office of President Kwame Nkrumah and as a journalist and editor of "African Review", an international magazine of political and economic affairs. He was host to Malcolm X in Ghana during the latter's trip to West Africa, and helped organize the first international branch of the Organization of Afro-American Unity in 1964. Mayfield left Ghana in 1965 and lived briefly in Spain before returning to the United States. Between 1967 and 1971, he taught at Cornell and New York Universities, lectured broadly, and starred in Jules Dassin's film "Uptight." The author lived in Guyana between 1971 and 1974, serving as an adviser to the minister of information and culture and to the prime minister, Forbes Burnham. He helped design the country's National Service, a compulsory development program for Guyanese youth. Mayfield was awarded a Senior Fulbright-Hays Fellowship to teach American studies in Germany for the academic year 1976-1977. For the remainder of his life, he worked as lecturer and writer-in-residence at the University of Maryland at College Park and at Howard University.

Connect to:

1. Finding Aid

Added author

1. Feelings, Tom.
2. Angelou, Maya.
3. Clarke, John Henrik, 1915-1998.
4. King, Woodie, Jr., 1937-
5. Nelson, Truman John, 1912-
6. Marshall, William, 1924-
7. Joseph, Gloria I.
8. Gibson, Richard, 1931-
9. Forman, James, 1928-2005.
10. Dee, Ruby.
11. Davis, Ossie.
12. Dassin, Jules, 1911-2008.
13. Windom, Alice.
14. Sinnette, Calvin.
15. Sinnette, Elinor Des Verney.
16. King, Preston T., 1936-
17. Du Bois, David Graham.
18. Branch, William B.
19. Boone, Sylvia Ardyn.
20. Bailey, Herman Kofi.
21. O'Brien, Conor Cruise, 1917-
22. Cordero, Ana Livia.
23. Guy, Rosa.
24. Williams, Robert Franklin, 1925-
25. Cambridge, Joan.

Research call number

1. Sc MG 339