Feb. 21, 2006: Richard Nugent

 Richard Nugent:

Profiles in Courage for Black History Month

Born into a socially prominent family on July 2, 1906, Nugent grew up in Washington, D.C. Nugent was 13 when his father died and the family moved to New York City. He was introduced to author Langston Hughes in 1925, and this event signaled the beginning of Nugent's lifelong fascination with the arts and his contribution to the literary and political movements of the Harlem Renaissance.

He explored issues of sexuality and black identity in his poems, short stories, and erotic drawings. His ardent bohemianism was the inspiration for the character of Paul Arbian, an artist and writer, in Wallace Thurman's 1932 novel Infants of the Spring.

In spite of his modest literary and artistic output and the equally small amount written about his life, Richard Bruce Nugent was a principal player in the New Negro movement. His unique and unorthodox personal style and sexual conventions snubbed the established mores of the time. Nugent’s lifestyle was that of the ultimate bohemian. Because of the notoriety surrounding him, and to avoid the disapproval of and embarrassment to his family, he assumed the pseudonym of Richard Bruce. It is this pseudonym that is often attached to his writings and drawings. He has been described as a “bizarre and eccentric vagabond poet,” and “a non-conformist who refused to accept so-called middle class standards.” Other attributes used to describe him were “cutting, good-looking, great sense of humor, and intelligent.”

“Shadows,” Nugent's first published poem, was anthologized in Contee Cullen’s 1927 work Caroling Dusk: An Anthology of Verse by Negro Poets. A one-act musical, “Sadhji: An African Ballet” (based on his earlier short story of the same name), was published in Plays of Negro Life: A Source-book of Native American Drama (1927) and produced in 1932. This African morality tale tells of the beautiful Sadhji, a chieftain's wife, beloved by Mrabo, her stepson, who, in turn, is loved by his male friend Numbo.

In 1926 Nugent contributed two brush-and-ink drawings and the short story “Smoke, Lilies, and Jade” (published under the name Richard Bruce) to the only issue of Fire!! A quarterly devoted to the younger Negro, was published through a collaboration between Wallace Thurman, Langston Hughes, Gwendolyn Bennett, Richard Bruce Nugent, Zora Neale Hurston, Aaron Douglas and John Davis. Due to controversy and financial constraints, only one issue of Fire!! was published. The story, which depicts a 19-year-old artist's sexual encounter with another man, was a deliberate attempt to shake up the conventional attitudes of middle-class African Americans. Although he continued to write the occasional article, Nugent supported himself first by acting, then by his involvement, during the 1930s, in the federal arts programs.

In 1952, Nugent married Grace Elizabeth Marr. He admits without any hesitation that the love he had for her was not a physical love or lust. They were married for seventeen years. Grace died of ovarian cancer in 1969 and Nugent of congestive heart failure seventeen years later in 1987. At the time of his death, he was living in Hoboken, New Jersey.