The novelist, poet, performer and playwright Ntozake Shange, best known for her 1976 Obie-winning choreopoem for colored girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enuf, died last Saturday at the age of 70. Shange had suffered from a series of strokes and was battling a severe neurological disorder, but no cause of death was announced.
Shange was born Paulette L. Williams in Trenton, New Jersey in 1948. Thanks to her family’s volunteering in the arts she was surrounded by celebrities, including Miles Davis, Chuck Berry, and W.E.B. Du Bois.
Shange began to write poetry and plays while in college and she was best known for her play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When The Rainbow is Enuf.
The play made its Broadway debut at the Booth Theater in 1976. It has since been adapted into a book and a 2010 Tyler Perry movie.
Shane was survived by Bayeza, her sister Bisa Williams, who served as U.S. Ambassador to Niger between 2010 and 2013, her brother Paul Williams, Jr., the Executive Director of the New York Board of the Dormitory Authority, her daughter, Savannah Shange, a professor of anthropology at the University of Santa Cruz, and a granddaughter.
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