Jessie Redmon Fauset

Jessie Redmon Fauset was an African American editor, poet, essayist, novelist, and educator. Her literary work helped sculpt African American literature in the 1920s as she focused on portraying a true image of African American life and history. Her Black fictional characters were working professionals, and her storylines related to themes of racial discrimination, “passing,” and feminism. Through her work as a literary editor and reviewer, Fauset discouraged Black writers from lessening the racial qualities of the characters in their work, and encouraged them to write honestly and openly about the African American experience. She published four novels during the 1920s and 1930s, exploring the lives of the black middle class. Fauset is known for discovering and mentoring other African American writers, including Langston Hughes, Jean Toomer, Countee Cullen, and Claude McKay.