Langston Hughes, (born Feb. 1, 1902, Joplin, Mo., U.S.—died May 22, 1967, New York, N.Y.), U.S. poet and writer. He published the poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” when he was 19, briefly attended Columbia University, and worked on an Africa-bound freighter. His literary career was launched when Hughes, working as a busboy, presented his poems to Vachel Lindsay as he dined. Hughes’s poetry collections include The Weary Blues (1926) and Montage of a Dream Deferred (1951). His later The Panther and the Lash (1967) reflects black anger and militancy. Among his other works are short stories (including “The Ways of White Folks,” 1934), autobiographies, many works for the stage, anthologies, and translations of poetry by Federico García Lorca and Gabriela Mistral. His well-known comic character Jesse B. Semple, called Simple, appeared in his newspaper columns.
