# Dark Room Collective

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{{Short description|African-American poetry collective}}
The '''Dark Room Collective''' was an influential [African-American poetry](/source/African-American_poetry) collective. Established in 1988, the collective hosted a reading series that featured leading figures in Black literature.

== Founding and activities ==
After attending the funeral of literary icon [James Baldwin](/source/James_Baldwin) in 1987, poets [Sharan Strange](/source/Sharan_Strange) and [Thomas Sayers Ellis](/source/Thomas_Sayers_Ellis), then Harvard undergraduates, with poet-composer Janice Lowe, a [Berklee College of Music](/source/Berklee_College_of_Music) student, co-founded the Dark Room Reading Series in 1988. The series was named for a project called ''The Dark Room: A Collection of Black Writing'', a library containing the works of black authors which was hosted in a former [darkroom](/source/darkroom) on the third floor of their Victorian house at 31 Inman Street in [Cambridge](/source/Cambridge%2C_Massachusetts).<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Strange|first1=Sharan|title=Dark Room Collective: Essay|date=Fall 2006|issue=16|url=http://mosaicmagazine.org/blog/?p=2616#.VOa9LTVVK1E|journal=Mosaic}}</ref>

The Dark Room Collective hosted a writing workshop and gatherings of black artists and writers at the house.<ref name="NYT">{{cite news|last1=Gordinier|first1=Jeff|title=The Dark Room Collective: Where Black Poetry Took Wing|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/27/arts/the-dark-room-collective-where-black-poetry-took-wing.html|work=The New York Times|date=May 27, 2014}}</ref> They were visited by African-American writers including [Alice Walker](/source/Alice_Walker), [bell hooks](/source/bell_hooks), [Toni Cade Bambara](/source/Toni_Cade_Bambara), [Derek Walcott](/source/Derek_Walcott), [Samuel R. Delany](/source/Samuel_R._Delany), poet [Essex Hemphill](/source/Essex_Hemphill), [Randall Kenan](/source/Randall_Kenan), [Terry McMillan](/source/Terry_McMillan), [Ntozake Shange](/source/Ntozake_Shange), [John Edgar Wideman](/source/John_Edgar_Wideman), and [Walter Mosley](/source/Walter_Mosley). They hosted a reading series that paired older writers with younger ones.<ref>{{cite magazine|last1=Eady|first1=Cornelius|last2=Alston|first2=Kwaku|title=Reading Ahead|url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1996/06/24/reading-ahead|magazine=The New Yorker|date=June 24, 1996}}</ref> The group was influenced by [Rita Dove](/source/Rita_Dove).<ref name="NYT" /> Following problems with their landlord, they relocated the reading series to the [Institute of Contemporary Art](/source/Institute_of_Contemporary_Art%2C_Boston) and later to the [Boston Playwrights' Theatre](/source/Boston_Playwrights'_Theatre).<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Reed|first1=Brian|title=The Dark Room Collective and Post-Soul Poetics|journal=African American Review|date=December 22, 2007|volume=41|issue=4|pages=727–747|url=https://www.academia.edu/3047524}}{{Dead link|date=January 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

The series ran through approximately 1998, though a "reunion tour" took place in 2012 and 2013.<ref name="NYT" />

== Influence and alumni ==
The Dark Room Collective has been influential in contemporary American and African-American poetry, inspiring the creation of the [Cave Canem Foundation](/source/Cave_Canem_Foundation)<ref name="NYT" /> and including many alumni who went on to be highly successful. Future [United States Poets Laureate](/source/United_States_Poet_Laureate) [Natasha Trethewey](/source/Natasha_Trethewey) and [Tracy K. Smith](/source/Tracy_K._Smith), ''[New Yorker](/source/The_New_Yorker)'' poetry editor [Kevin Young](/source/Kevin_Young_(poet)), [Carl Phillips](/source/Carl_Phillips), [Major Jackson](/source/Major_Jackson), [Patrick Sylvain](/source/Patrick_Sylvain), [Tisa Bryant](/source/Tisa_Bryant), [Danielle Legros Georges](/source/Danielle_Legros_Georges), Artress Bethany White, Trasi Johnson, Adisa Beatty, [Nehassaiu deGannes](/source/Nehassaiu_deGannes), Donia Allen, Della Scott and [John Keene](/source/John_Keene_(writer)) were among the members of the collective.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Muyumba|first1=W.|title=The Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics|date=2012|publisher=Princeton University Press|location=Princeton|isbn=978-0-691-15491-6|page=337|edition=4th|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MJVlZjIe5o8C&q=%22dark%20room%20collective%22&pg=PA337|chapter=Dark Room Collective}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last1=Bartley|first1=Emma|title=To Borrow and To Burrow: A Look at the Dark Room Collective|date=March 15, 2018|publisher=National Endowment for the Arts|url=https://www.arts.gov/stories/blog/2018/borrow-and-burrow-look-dark-room-collective}}</ref>

==See also==
*[Black Arts Movement](/source/Black_Arts_Movement)
*[Harlem Renaissance](/source/Harlem_Renaissance)

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:Defunct poetry organizations based in the United States
Category:Defunct African-American arts organizations
Category:American artist groups and collectives
Category:20th-century American poets
Category:African-American literature
Category:History of Cambridge, Massachusetts
Category:Arts organizations established in 1988

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