This volume focuses on the principal African-American poets from colonial times to the Harlem Renaissance and the World War II era, paying tribute to a rich heritage that has deeply influenced the nation's literature. Poets covered in this volume include Phillis Wheatley, author of the first volume of verse published by an African American, and the seminal figures Gwendolyn Brooks, Countee Cullen, Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and Jean Toomer. Complete with a chronology, bibliography, and notes on the contributors, this new volume in the Bloom's Modern Critical Views series also features an essay by noted literary critic Harold Bloom, who introduces the volume with his thoughts on this group of vibrant poets whose work has altered the landscape of American literature.