The first of five autobiographical volumes, evoking the author's childhood with her grandmother in the American South of the thirties, and recounting her experience of discrimination as a black, and the terrible trauma of rape by her grandfather. First published in 1984.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (Student's Virago)

Biographies & Memoirs

Angelou, Maya.

Arts & Literature

Virago Press Ltd.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute insult of bigotry, and the wonder of words that can make the world right. Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide. Sent by their mother to live with their devout, self-sufficient grandmother in a small Southern town, Maya and her brother, Bailey, endure the ache of abandonment and the prejudice of the local “powhitetrash.” At eight years old and back at her mother’s side in St. Louis, Maya is attacked by a man many times her age—and has to live with the consequences for a lifetime. Years later, in San Francisco, Maya learns that love for herself, the kindness of others, her own strong spirit, and the ideas of great authors (“I met and fell in love with William Shakespeare”) will allow her to be free instead of imprisoned. Poetic and powerful, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings will touch hearts and change minds for as long as people read. “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings liberates the reader into life simply because Maya Angelou confronts her own life with such a moving wonder, such a luminous dignity.”—James Baldwin

Ballantine Books

MY PAINTED HOUSE, MY FRIENDLY CHICKEN, AND ME

Children's Books

Literature & Fiction

Clarkson Potter, Inc.

Listen to Maya Angelou read more than 100 of her best loved poems - for the first time in one collection."As good as Angelou's books are, you just have to hear her." - Philadelphia InquirerJust Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie(30 minutes, 27 poems)James Baldwin called Maya Angelou's first collection of poems "Black, bitter, and beautiful. [Maya Angelou] speaks of our survival. Sister Maya has been there and back, she knows something about herself and she knows something about us . . ."Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit Me Well(35 minutes, 36 poems)The poems in this second volume of Maya Angelou's poetry are eloquent evidence of the poet's continuing celebration of life. Here are poems of love and memory, poems of racial confrontation, poems of misplaced patriotism, songs of the street and songs of the heart.I Shall Not Be Moved(40 minutes, 32 poems)A wonderful collection of poems includ

The Maya Angelou Poetry Collection

Poetry

Random House Audio |

These new poems are powerful, distinctive and as always, full of lifting rhythms of love and remembering. From the Hardcover edition.

And Still I Rise: A Selection of Poems Read by the Author

Dramas & Plays

Even the Stars Look Lonesome

Community & Culture

Maya Angelou, one of the best-loved authors of our time, shares the wisdom of a remarkable life in this best-selling spiritual classic. This is Maya Angelou talking from the heart, down to earth and real, but also inspiring. This is a book to treasured, a book about being in all ways a woman, about living well, about the power of the word, and about the power do spirituality to move and shape your life. Passionate, lively, and lyrical, Maya Angelou's latest unforgettable work offers a gem of truth on every page.

Wouldn't Take Nothing For My Journey Now

Maya Angelou Poetry Collection

The Heart of a Woman

Random House Audio Voices

The culmination of a unique achievement in modern American literature: the six volumes of autobiography that began more than thirty years ago with the appearance of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. A Song Flung Up to Heaven opens as Maya Angelou returns from Africa to the United States to work with Malcolm X. But first she has to journey to California to be reunited with her mother and brother. No sooner does she arrive there than she learns that Malcolm X has been assassinated. Devastated, she tries to put her life back together, working on the stage in local theaters and even conducting a door-to-door survey in Watts. Then Watts explodes in violence, a riot she describes firsthand. Subsequently, on a trip to New York, she meets Martin Luther King, Jr., who asks her to become his coordinator in the North, and she visits black churches all over America to help support King’s Poor People’s March. But once again tragedy strikes. King is assassinated, and this time Angelou completely withdraws from the world, unable to deal with this horrible event. Finally, James Baldwin forces her out of isolation and insists that she accompany him to a dinner party—where the idea for writing I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is born. In fact, A Song Flung Up to Heaven ends as Maya Angelou begins to write the first sentences of Caged Bird.

A Song Flung Up to Heaven

Random House, Large Print

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Books by Angelou, Maya.