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Paul Robeson (April 9, 1898 - January 23, 1976) was an American actor, athlete, singer, writer, and political and civil rights activist.
Robeson was born in Princeton, New Jersey and a graduate of Somerville, New Jersey High School where he excelled at singing, acting, and athletics. After the early death of his mother, he was raised by his father, a preacher and escaped slave, who impressed upon him the need for self-improvement through education. Taking this to heart, he won a scholarship to Rutgers University where he excelled in both academics and sports (he was class valedictorian, became an All-American in American Football, had fifteen varsity letters, and was selected to Cap and Skull), and went on to earn a law degree at Columbia University. He was in the same law school class as William O. Douglas. He quit the legal profession after a secretary refused to take dictation from a Black man. Robeson also studied at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, where he claims he was alerted to the power and strength of his heritage, by learning about the history of Africa.
Robeson found fame as an actor and singer (he had a fine bass voice), and acclaimed performances as Eugene O'Neill's The Emperor Jones (originating the title role on the stage), Porgy and Bess and, in 1930, as Othello in England, when no US company would employ him for the role. He reprised the role in New York in 1943. At the time the Broadway run of Othello was the longest Broadway run of any Shakespeare play. He won the Spingarn Medal in 1945 for his performance. Uta Hagen played Desdemona, and José Ferrer played Iago. Robeson's repertoire of African-American folk songs helped bring these to much wider attention both inside the US and abroad - in particular his stunning rendition of "Go Down Moses".
Between 1925 and 1942 Robeson appeared in over a dozen Hollywood films. He reprised his title role in the film version of The Emperor Jones in 1933. He was cast as Joe in the 1937 film version of Show Boat. It was in this film that he performed "Ol' Man River". He also was Umbopa in the 1937 version of King Solomon's Mines.
On his frequent trips overseas he was highly critical of the conditions experienced by black Americans, especially in the segregated southern states. This outspokenness, together with sympathies expressed towards the people of the Soviet Union (which largely stemmed from his belief that the African-American slaves shared a common bond with the pre-revolutionary serfs of Russia) led to his being branded a communist by J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI.
Undeterred, he still occasionally sang overseas, including a performance at the Welsh National Eisteddfod conducted over the telephone. In 1940, Robeson had appeared in The Proud Valley, in which he played a black labourer arriving in south Wales and winning the hearts of the local population; he continues to be thought of as having particular links with Wales, where his political views were not seen as controversial.
In 1949, Robeson performed a concert in Peekskill, New York. After the concert, organized anti-Communist and racist vigilantes attacked departing concertgoers, while local police stood by and did nothing. The local newspaper was accused of encouraging the attacks, dubbed the Peekskill Riots.
He was hounded by the McCarthyite House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) that attempted to cite him for refusal to sign the non-communist declaration. In complicity with the HUAC the US State Department denied him a passport which effectively confined him to the United States. During a 1952 tour of the United States a concert was organized at the International Peace Arch on the border between Washington State and British Columbia. This was done as an act of defiance against the authorities who refused to allow him to cross the border. The concert took place on May 18, 1952. Paul Robeson stood on the back of a flat bed truck on the American side of the Canada-US border and performed a concert for a large crowd on the Canadian side, variously estimated at between 20,000 and 40,000 people.
Prior to his passport's return in 1958, Robeson wrote a book, Here I Stand, which eloquently makes an impassioned case for concerted action to right the inequities of the Jim Crow system. After he got back his passport he spent five years touring the world, playing Othello again in 1959 in Tony Richardson's production at Stratford-upon-Avon, and singing throughout Europe and in Australia and New Zealand. It was on his visit to England that he befriended English actor Andrew Faulds and inspired him to take up a career in politics. His health broke down and he spent time in Russian and East German hospitals. The remainder of his life was plagued by ill health and depression, and his appearances were relatively few. His 75th birthday was celebrated in Carnegie Hall where a taped message from him was played.
Paul Robeson died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1976 where he had been living with his sister. He was interred in the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York. His wife Essie Cardozo Goode (who was related to Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Cardozo) had predeceased him.
Although Robeson is one of the "Great Forerunners" in Black equality, the McCarthy era virtually erased his memory from the consciousness of younger Americans. He was conversant in over 20 languages, and at one time carried enough clout to be considered for a vice presidential spot on Henry A. Wallace's 1948 ticket. His singing voice was a sonorous bass-baritone once described thus: "If God should come to earth and sing, He would sound something like Paul Robeson."
Some critics have stated that Robeson’s status as a “victim” of the HUAC’s investigation is unwarranted due to the extensive ties Robeson had with both the Soviet Union and the CPUSA, which was known to be actively involved in espionage against the United States. However there has never been any evidence that Robeson himself had committed espionage or treason.
The story of Itzik Feffer is an example of the lengths Paul Robeson would go to to defend the communist Soviet Union.
It was in appreciation of his support that in 1953 he was awarded the Stalin Peace Prize. However, in a concert broadcast live across the Soviet Union, Robeson subtly defied Stalin's campaign against Jewish "cosmopolitism" by he ended his set with a song sung in Yiddish, Dos Partizanenlied aka Song of the Warsaw Ghetto Rebellion, an act that was interpreted by many Jews listening to the broadcast as a sign of solidarity and sympathy. The Yiddish song was cut from rebroadcasts of the concert. (This is recounted in Mary M. Leder's book My Life in Stalinist Russia).
Robeson also wrote a tribute to Joseph Stalin in April, 1953 shortly after Stalin's death entitled To You Beloved Comrade.
In 2004, the U.S. Postal Service honored Robeson with a stamp in the Black Heritage Series.
External links
- Paul Robeson Timeline at Rutgers University
- American National Biography Online
- Rutgers Celebrates the Paul Robeson Stamp
- To You Beloved Comrade by Paul Robeson