Langston Hughes was born on February 1, 1902 in Joplin, Missouri. When Hughes and his mother settled in Cleveland, Ohio it was then that he started to write poetry. He regularly contributed to his school's literary magazine. Langston graduated high school in 1920 and went for a year to live with his father in Mexico. He wrote "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" around this time and it was published in The Crisis magazine. Hughes came back to the United States and went to Columbia University but shortly dropped out in 1922. He then worked many jobs around New York for a year before becoming a steward on a freighter that took him to Spain and Africa. In 1924, he left the ship and lived shortly in Paris, where he continued to develop and publish his poetry. Langston returned to the United States in 1924. In 1925, he met a poet named Vachel Lindsay. Lindsay used his connections to promote Hughes' poetry. In 1925, Hughes wrote "The Weary Blues" which won first prize in the Opportunity magazine literary competition. He received a scholarship to go to Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. While at Lincoln, novelist and critic Carl Van Vechten used his connections to get Hughes first book of poetry, "The Weary Blues" published in 1926. Langston Hughes was one of the first to use jazz rhythms and dialect to portray the life of urban blacks in his work. The Big Sea was Hughes' autobiography up to age 28 and was published in 1940. Hughes wrote lyrics for a Broadway musical (The Street) in the late 1940s. Also, he taught creative writing at Atlanta University. Hughes won a total of 14 award, wrote 15 poems, and 12 short stories. Langston Hughes died on May 22, 1967 from complications from prostate cancer.
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