Poet, novelist, and journalist Claude McKay was born in 1890 in Jamaica. The youngest of eleven children, he was sent to live with an older brother—a schoolteacher—who took charge of his education, introducing him to the classics of British literature, such as works by John Milton, Alexander Pope, and the Romantics. McKay began writing poetry at the age of ten, and by the time he immigrated to the United States at age twenty-two, he had published two volumes of verse. In America, McKay faced the harsh realities of racism and, despite his education, took on menial jobs to make a living. McKay became known for his protest poetry, which spoke directly about racial issues and the trials of the working class. Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen considered McKay an inspirational voice during the Harlem Renaissance. McKay’s novels include Home to Harlem (1922), Banjo: A Story without a Plot (1929), and Banana Bottom (1933). He lived abroad, in England and France, on and off for years, but returned to the United States in 1934, where he worked in Chicago as a journalist, writing mostly for left-leaning publications. McKay died in 1948, having never returned to Jamaica.
If We Must Die
Inspired by a wave of lynchings, “If We Must Die” encourages resistance, even if a fight seems doomed. While some people believe that Winston Churchill quoted lines from “If We Must Die,” there is no evidence to support that claim. Nevertheless, “If We Must Die,” first published in the July 1919 issue of the Liberator, shares many qualities with Churchill’s World War II speeches.
If we must die, let it not be like hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs,
Making their mock at our accurséd lot.
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If we must die, O let us nobly die,
So that our precious blood may not be shed
In vain; then even the monsters we defy
Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!
O Kinsmen! we must meet the common foe!
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Though far outnumbered let us show us brave,
And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow!
What though before us lies the open grave?
Like men we’ll face the murderous, cowardly pack,
Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!
(1919)