(July 7, 1915-November 30, 1998) was an American poet and author born in Birmingham, Alabama. She wrote as Margaret Alexander. Her father Sigismund C. Walker was a Methodist minister and her mother was Marion Dozier Walker. They helped get her started in literature by teaching a lot of philosophy and poetry to her as a child.
In 1935, Walker received her Bachelors of Arts Degree from Northwestern University and in 1936 she began work with the Federal Writer's Project under the Works Progress Administration. In 1942 she received her master's degree in creative writing from the University of Iowa. In 1965 she returned to that school to earn her Ph.D. She also for a time served as a professor at what is today Jackson State University.
Her literature generally contained African American themes. Among her more popular works were her poem For My People, which won the Yale Award for Young Poets and her 1996 novel Jubilee, which received critical acclaim. In 1988 she sued Alex Haley, claiming his novel Roots: The Saga of an American Family had violated on Jubilee's copyright. The case was dismissed.
Margaret Walker died of cancer in Chicago in 1998.
Poems - 15 in all
I Want to Write
We Have Been Believers
For My People
For Malcolm X
Big John Henry
Love Song for Alex, 1979
THE STRUGGLE STAGGERS US
Long John Nelson And Sweetiepie