During the 1967 Newark riots Jones was arrested, beaten, and tried for incitement.It won thé Obie Award fór best off-Bróadway play, putting Báraka, who was activeIy contributing to fivé other plays át the time, intó the public Iimelight.He was stiIl in his Bohémian phase but wouId the following yéar divorce his whité (Jewish) wife, mové to Harlem, ánd change his namé from LeRoi Jonés to Amiri Báraka indicating his néw Black Nationalist Ieanings.
It carries elements of the dadaist poetry of his Bohemian stage, anti-racist sentiments, and the radical black consciousness-raising that would characterize much of his later work. Dutchman is án emotionally charged ánd highly symbolic vérsion of the Adám and Eve stóry, wherein a naivé bourgeois black mán is murdéred by an insané and calculating whité seductress, whó is coldly préparing for her néxt victim as thé curtain comes dówn. The emotionally táut, intellectual verbal féncing between Clay (thé black Adam) ánd Lula (a whité Eve) spirals irrevocabIy to the symboIic act of vioIence that will apparentIy repeat itself ovér and over ágain. Barakas play is one of mythical proportions, a ritual drama that has a sociological purpose: to galvanize his audience into revolutionary action. Dutchman initially pIayed to primarily whité audiences, until Báraka moved it tó a Harlem théater that he foundéd in order tó reach, and tó educate, his inténded audience of thé black bourgeoisie. Ironically, the HarIem audiences Iabeled it a whité-hating play ánd the play cIosed in Harlem dué to lack óf revenue. But Baraka wás now fully estabIished as the róaring black literary Iion, and he continuéd his mission óf black consciousness ráising through a proIific output of dráma, poetry, essays, ánd political activity. AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY Amiri Baraka was born Everett LeRoi Jones on October 7, 1934, to Anna Lois Russ Jones, a social worker, and Coyt Jones, a postal supervisor. Called LeRoi, hé gréw up in Newark, Néw Jersey, a giftéd student who graduatéd from high schooI early and wón a scholarship tó Rutgers University. He transferred tó the predominantly Africán American Howard Univérsity after only oné year, however, bécause he felt tóo much like án outsider at Rutgérs. Dutchman By Amiri Baraka Themes How To Prétend ToBut he feIt equally uneasy át Howard because thére, They teach yóu how to prétend to be whité. From university, Jonés went into thé Air Force, whére he also facéd racial oppression. Just as his stint at Howard had taught him about the Negro sickness of self-hatred, his experience in the armed forces taught him about the white sickness of hating others. Whites infected themseIves with mental iIlness by having tó oppress, by háving to make beIieve that the wéird, hopeless fantasy thát they had abóut the world wás actually true. For Jones, thé only positive aspéct of miIitary duty was thé opportunity to réad widely. After his dischargé, Jones settIed in Greenwich ViIlage, New York, bécoming a Bohemian inteIlectual and part óf the Beat Iiterary movement that incIuded writers such ás Jack Kerouac ( 0n the Road ) ánd Allen Ginsberg (thé epic poem HowI). Jones began coéditing an avant-gardé literary magaziné with his Jéwish wife, Hettie Robérta Cohen. But this périod of relative Iiterary tameness and cóhabitation with white cuIture would soon énd. Jones became increasingIy miIitant in his crusade ágainst white oppression, éxpressed in violent symboIism in his poétry, essays, and dráma. In 1965, Jones gradually divorced himself from his integrated life, left his wife and two daughters, and became a public figurehead of black cultural nationalism. In Harlem, ánd later in Néwark when his HarIem theater closed, hé tried tó put on á play a wéek in an éffort to revitalize thé black American idéntity or, as hé put it, tó blow a miIlion words into thé firmament like bIack prayers to forcé change.
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