#25 Paul Robeson: Singer, Actor, Activist, American

Happy Tuesday, Daily Concept readers.

This is the first Daily Concept about a person instead of an idea. There’s no better person I can think of to write about than Paul Robeson. He was a great American and leader of the African-American community whose memory has largely been lost in the nearly 50 years since his death.

Before Malcolm X and Martin Luther King were household names, Robeson was the most well-known African-American person in the world.

He was a genuine renaissance man who succeeded in a remarkable number of fields: All-American football player, Columbia-educated lawyer, Shakespearean actor, world-renowned gospel singer, civil rights activist, and much more.

Who Was Paul Robeson?

Robeson’s father William Drew Robson was a former slave who escaped North Carolina via the Underground Railroad in 1960. He went on to become a pastor for the black community in and around Princeton, New Jersey, where young Paul grew up.

Paul received a full scholarship to Rutgers University, where he was the only Black student on campus. He would eventually graduate as class valedictorian.

Athlete: When Robeson tried to join the Rutgers football team, the white athletes beat him viciously on the practice field to discourage him from playing. Despite a broken nose and a dislocated shoulder, Robeson made the team — and went on to become a two-time All-American.

In the late 1910s, people around the country knew that “Robeson at Rutgers” was the best college football player in America.

Lawyer: After college, Robeson enrolled at Columbia Law School and got married. He did not practice law for long after graduating from Columbia, as he bristled against the blatant racism of the American legal profession.

Instead, Robeson looked to professional fields where his talents would not be stifled by racism and discrimination. Robeson began acting in plays in Harlem, and his star power was soon recognized by his contemporaries.

Actor: He went on to star in a number of plays, most prominently Shakespeare’s Othello. The New York version of the play featuring Robeson was the longest-running play in Broadway history at the time, running for nearly 300 performances.

He also performed Othello and other plays in London, where he lived between 1928 and 1939. Robeson was also the first African-American film star, playing leading roles in a number of British and American films throughout the 1930s and 1940s.

During his time in the United Kingdom, Robeson became acquainted with several future African leaders and learned about his Nigerian lineage. He said of his time there:

Singer: With a rich and deep bass-baritone voice to match his imposing 6’3’’ frame, Robeson looked the part as a gospel singer.

He popularized African-American spiritual songs among a White American and international audience during the 1940s and 1950s, and also introduced American audiences to folk music from around the world.

During his prodigious career, Robeson recorded 66 albums and 195 singles. And that’s not counting the concerts and performances he gave in dozens of countries around the world.

Activist: Robeson had always been interested in improving the plight of African-Americans in the U.S., but it was during his years abroad that his political consciousness reached its full maturity.

In 1929, when he was returning from a matinee performance of his popular play Show Boat in London, Robeson heard singing in the streets. He investigated the source and found a group of Welsh miners who had walked from Wales to London to protest unfair working conditions and anti-union actions taken by the owners of the coal mines in Wales' Rhondda valley.

Robeson immediately joined the march and even gave the ragtag group money for food and transportation back to Wales. He later hosted relief concerts to support the impoverished Welsh miners and visited Welsh towns and cities to sing for the miners and their families.

In the years that followed, Robeson spoke and sang on behalf of other impoverished and oppressed groups around the world. He also became outspoken about his left-wing views and visited the Soviet Union, earning the ire of the U.S. government. In 1950, the State Department revoked Robeson’s passport to prevent him from traveling abroad.

In 1956, when McCarthyism was in full swing, Robeson was called to testify before the infamous House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in Congress. Robeson had declined to answer questions about whether he was a communist, telling the hearing:

BONUS: If you want to listen to a very cool re-enactment of Robeson’s HUAC testimony by actor James Earl Jones, click here.

The backlash against his testimony led many radio stations to stop playing his music in the late 1950s and 1960s. Although Robeson continued to tour the world after his passport was returned to him in 1958, he spent the last years of his life in self-imposed solitude and died in 1976.

Learn More: The Richness of Robeson

Paul Robeson led such a fascinating and important life that a simple email can’t truly summarize it all (despite my best efforts).

Some of the links throughout the text above provide more information about Robeson’s life and work, but I have four special recommendations for those of you who want to learn more about this great man.

First: If you’re interested in hearing Paul’s singing voice, check out this short video of him singing for a group of Scottish miners in 1949.

Second: I recommend reading Robeson’s autobiography, Here I Stand. It’s a short, well-written book that is available for less than $10 on Amazon. I first became familiar with Paul Robeson by reading my grandfather’s paperback copy. The book would make for a great Christmas present.

Third: If you want to hear some of the iconic songs Robeson recorded, many of his albums (including the great 1946 album Spirituals) are available on YouTube.

Fourth: To learn more about his life, watch the 1999 PBS documentary about Robeson entitled “Here I Stand”. It’s nearly two hours long, but I promise that it’s worth it. You’ll learn a lot about the history of African-American culture and politics by watching it.

ART OF THE DAY

Thank you for reading. Please reply to this email if you have any thoughts or feedback.

Yours,
Dan