Arthur P. Davis

Arthur Paul Davis (November 21, 1904 – April 21, 1996) was an influential American university professor, literary scholar, and the writer and editor of several important critical texts such as The Negro Caravan, The New Cavalcade, and From the Dark Tower: Afro-American Writers 1900–1960.

He was African-American.

Influenced by the Harlem Renaissance, Davis has inspired many African-Americans to pursue literature and the arts.

Arthur P. Davis was born on November 21, 1904, in Hampton, Virginia.

He was raised by his parents, Frances Nash Davis and Andrew Davis along with his eight brothers.

In an autobiographical essay entitled "Columbia-College and Renaissance Harlem-Autobiographical Essay", Davis describes his father, who worked as a plasterer, as an authoritarian figure, "a Victorian head-of-the-house but also an excellent parent."

Although Davis was a gifted grammar school student, he was also required to help contribute to the family household during the summers by working at a black resort on the Chesapeake Bay.

After graduating from Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in 1922, Davis spent a year attending Howard University in Washington, D.C., where he then transferred to Columbia College in New York City.

As the first integrated school that he attended, Davis recalled the oppressive responsibility of the move in his autobiographical essay "Columbia College and Renaissance Harlem":

"I felt that the whole 'race' rode on my poor weak shoulders, that somehow if I failed, I would be letting down all Negroes. Many Negroes of my generation assumed that attitude when they attended Northern white schools. It helped to make us more competitive."

Despite having a scholarship, Davis boarded with a family in Harlem and needed to earn money for his room and board.

Davis sought work from city politician Charlie Anderson (who was married to Davis's cousin, Emma Anderson), as well as from a close associate of Booker T. Washington, Davis was only able to acquire menial jobs such as a late night apartment-house elevator boy and an unsuccessful stint as a houseboy in a Park Avenue mansion.

Davis graduated as a Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia College in 1927, which made him only the second black student to receive this honor.

Between 1927 and 1928 Davis was an instructor in the English department of North Carolina College, which is now known as North Carolina Central University.

He received his master's degree from Columbia in 1929 although he had already begun his academic career elsewhere.

He then transferred to Virginia Union University in 1929, where he worked as an English professor until 1944.

Davis states, "Harlem was a Nigger Heaven to my provincial eyes; and there were thousands of other migrants like me who felt the charm of the black ghetto."

Davis saw or met many of the creative celebrities of the day.

Including James Weldon Johnson, Wallace Thurman, Paul Robeson, Richard Bruce Nugent, Ethel Waters, and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, as well as important political and intellectual figures like Marcus Garvey and W. E. B. Du Bois.

He also met the important writer during the Harlem Renaissance and editor of The New Negro Alain Locke.

Arthur Davis became the first black American to receive a PhD in English in 18th-century English literature from Columbia University in 1942.

He began teaching at Howard University in 1944.

This was the institute that Davis was most associated with.

He was an English professor at Howard until 1969, which he then was appointed professor emeritus.

In 1984, the university awarded him an honorary doctorate in literature.

At Howard, Davis' mission as an educator and academic writer became clear.

He was inspired by the Harlem Renaissance heroes that he had met in New York City.

Davis was also influenced by powerful orators like Garvey.

In Davis' essay "Columbia College and Renaissance Harlem", he recalled that he and his friends "were impressed in spite of ourselves by the emphasis he put on pride in race, pride in blackness. It touched us and unconsciously influenced the thinking and writing" of many of the poets of their generation.

The spirit of the Harlem Renaissance was on Davis' agenda for the rest of his career.

He made his focus as a teacher and critic on the work of black American writers.

In his first ten years at Howard, Davis became a prolific advocate of black literary endeavors, publishing at least 34 articles, reviews, and miscellaneous critical works.

Co-written by Sterling Brown, Arthur P. Davis, and Ulysses Lee, The Negro Caravan sought to "present a body of artistically valid writings by American Negro authors, to present a truthful mosaic of Negro character and experience in America, and to collect in one volume certain key literary works that have greatly influenced the thinking of American Negroes, and to a lesser degree, that of Americans as a whole."

Davis was the respective co-editor in many of the publishings.

However, in his second year, Davis was able to find a job as a counselor with the Children's Aid Society on East 127th Street thanks to a Hampton connection.

Davis looks back on this experience stating, "As an undergraduate I naturally did not fully understand the significance of the events happening around me, but I did get the feel of the times."

Davis attended Columbia during the most active years of the Harlem Renaissance.

"I had a ringside seat", he recalled in his "Columbia College and Renaissance Harlem" essay, "on the events of those stirring and exhilarating years it was bliss to be alive in those days."

Blues singer Bessie Smith, a famous singer, lived across an air shaft from Davis' for a short time on 133rd Street.

He was more interested in her earthly and racy conversations than her singing.