John Oliver Killens

Early life and education

Killens was born in Macon, Georgia, to Charles Myles Killens, Sr, and Willie Lee Killens. His father encouraged him to read Langston Hughes' writings, and his mother, who was president of Dunbar Literary Club, introduced him to poetry. Killens was an enthusiastic reader as a child and was inspired by writers such as Hughes and Richard Wright. His great-grandmother’s tales of slavery were another important factor in his gaining knowledge of traditional black mythology and folklore, which he later incorporated into his writings.

Killens graduated in 1933 from Ballard Normal School in Macon, a private institution run by the American Missionary Association and at the time one of the few secondary schools for blacks in Georgia. Planning to be a lawyer, he attended historically black colleges and universities to study further at the college level and focus on law: Edward Waters College in Jacksonville, Florida, Morris Brown College in Atlanta, Howard University in Washington, D.C., and in 1939 the Robert H. Terrell Law School in Washington, D.C. In his final year, he left in order to study creative writing at Columbia University in New York.

Killens enlisted in the army during World War II, serving as a member of the Pacific amphibious forces from 1942 to 1945. He spent more than two years in the South Pacific, and rose to the rank of master sergeant.

Literary career

In 1948, Killens moved to New York City, where he worked to establish a literary career. He attended writing classes at Columbia University and New York University. He was an active member of many organizations, including the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). Around 1950, Killens co-founded with Rosa Guy and others a writers' group that became the Harlem Writers Guild (HWG).

His first novel, Youngblood (1954), dealing with a black Georgia family in the early 1900s, was read and developed at HWG meetings in members' homes. His second novel, And Then We Heard the Thunder (1962), was about the treatment of the black soldiers in the military; it was named by critic Noel Perrin as one of five major works of fiction of World War II. His third novel, Sippi (1967), focused on the voting rights struggles of African Americans during the 1960s.

Slaves (1969), a historical novel, was based on the screenplay turned into a book to accompany the release of the film. Previously, in 1959, Killens was used as a front by the then blacklisted author Abraham Polonsky, who had adapted William P. McGivern's novel for the film Odds Against Tomorrow.

The Cotillion; or, One Good Bull Is Half the Herd (1971) explored upper-class African-American society. In addition to novels, Killens also wrote plays, screenplays, and many articles and short stories that appeared in publications as diverse as Black Scholar, the New York Times, Ebony and Redbook.

He taught creative-writing programs at Fisk University, Howard University, Columbia University and Medgar Evers College. In 1986, he founded the National Black Writers Conference at Medgar Evers College.

Personal life

In 1943 Killens married Grace Ward Jones. They had two children together: a son, John Charles, and a daughter, Barbara.

In 1987, Killens died of cancer in Brooklyn, NY, aged 71.