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Festus Claudius "Claude" McKay was a Jamaican-American writer and poet, who was a seminal figure in the Harlem Renaissance. He wrote four novels: Home to Harlem, a best-seller that won the Harmon Gold Award for Literature, Banjo, Banana Bottom, and in 1941 a manuscript called Amiable With Big Teeth: A Novel of the Love Affair Between the Communists and the Poor Black Sheep of Harlem that has not yet been published. McKay also authored collections of poetry, a collection of short stories, Gingertown, two autobiographical books, A Long Way from Home and My Green Hills of Jamaica, and a non-fiction, socio-historical treatise entitled Harlem: Negro Metropolis. His 1922 poetry collection, Harlem Shadows, was among the first books published during the Harlem Renaissance. His Selected Poems was published posthumously, in 1953. McKay was attracted to communism in his early life, but he always asserted that he never became an official member of the Communist Party USA. However, some scholars dispute the claim that he was not a communist at that time, noting his close ties to active members, his attendance at communist-led events, and his months-long stay in the Soviet Union in 1922–23, which he wrote about very favorably. He gradually became disillusioned with communism, however, and by the mid-1930s, he had begun to write negatively about it.

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List of poems by Claude McKay 80 total

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Futility
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Absence
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Africa
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America
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Outcast
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The White City
 702 Views
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If We Must Die
 516 Views
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The Castaways
 462 Views
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The Harlem Dancer
 385 Views
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In Bondage
 383 Views
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Adolescence
 372 Views
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The Lynching
 367 Views
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A Red Flower
 296 Views
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The Spanish Needle
 278 Views
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Alfonso, Dressing to Wait at Table
 269 Views
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I Shall Return
 267 Views
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French Leave
 264 Views
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White Houses
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Birds of Prey
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To One Coming North
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Romance
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Song of the Moon
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A Prayer
 243 Views
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Courage
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The White House
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