Maya Angelou Recites Her Poem "Harlem Hopscotch"

[0:00]Do you think that white critics have a right to judge black artists? Well, certainly I think they have a right. It would help if they understood what they were talking about. Quite often, there are allusions made in Black American writing. There are rhythms set in the writing and counter rhythms, which mean a great deal to Blacks. A white American can come in and, he'll understand, hopefully the gist, and that's what one is talking about. The other, it's sort of "in" talk. I think that it's dangerous if we start setting up white critics as the end-all, be-all of a piece of work by a Black writer, a Black musician. Because there's a poem in in a book of mine, called Harlem Hopscotch. Now, hopscotch, anywhere it's done, is as we know. But in Harlem, that's basic. But there are other counter rhythms that are going on, so that the kids step da, ja, jam-bum ja, ja, ja, ja bum pom, ja, ja, ja, ja bum. See? So the poem says—I wrote, says, One foot down, then hop! It's hot. Good things for the ones that's got. Another jump, now to the left. Everybody for hisself. In the air, now both feet down. Since you're Black, don't stick around. Food is gone, rent is due, you cuss and jump and then you jump two. Everybody is out of work, You cover for three and then twist and jerk. Count the line, they count you out. But that's what hoppin's all about. Both feet down, the game is done. They think you lost. And I think you won. Now, when a non-Black critic approaches the work, he's going to see the social implications in the lines which are there, hopefully. Because kids who are jumping hopscotch in Harlem are thinking different thoughts than those who are jumping hopscotch on Park Avenue. But he will not hear what cracks up a Black-American audience when they hear it, because it's such a-