Lorraine Hansberry

Shout out to Lorraine Hansberry—playwright and activist.

A beautiful flower withered from the world too soon, you were artistically endowed and unimpeachably Black. You astoundingly painted the portrait of racial segregation with your legendary play A Raisin in the Sun. As a result, in 1959, you became the first African American woman to have a play performed on Broadway.

While active in the Civil Rights and gay community, you had a powerful effect on everyone in your orbit. You provided personal inspiration to Nina Simone and were a friend and confidant to Duke Ellington, W.E.B Dubois and other intellectuals.

As a child, your family was brutally attacked by your neighbors simply for moving into a White neighborhood. However, your father—the son of freed slaves—stood firm and elevated his case to the Supreme Court (U.S.) in Hansberry v. Lee (1940). Pancreatic cancer took your life in 1965 at the young age of 34; and at my current age of 34, I just want to coronate you with a coronet.

#BlackHistoryMonth™ #BHM #WorldCancerDay

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