PRIDE
Am I the only one who wishes they could go back in time? Not to certain eras or time periods, but to certain moments. For example, I would love to go to Hastings Street in Detroit’s Paradise Valley to see Duke Ellington play Mood Indigo and to see Lady Day belt out Strange Fruit. I would love to travel on the Chitlin Circuit, that collection of segregated touring venues that birthed the careers of many Black entertainers, to witness two of my all time favorite comedians, Redd Foxx and Richard Pryor, in their early days. I would also love to travel back in time to the Harlem Renaissance. Can you imagine seeing the chorus girls at the Cotton Club and arguably the most famous chorus girl, Lena Horne, live? And after the Cotton Club, I would head down 125th to the Apollo Theater to see singer and pianist, Gladys Bentley.
I was introduced to Gladys Bentley in a recent book: Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals by Saidiya Hartman. I’ve seen many reviews of this book describe it as “lyrical.” It is. However, I will use some of Hartman’s own words to describe the text:
“At the turn of the twentieth century, young black women were in open rebellion. They struggled to create autonomous and beautiful lives, to escape the new forms of servitude awaiting them, and to live as if they were free. This book recreates the radical imagination and wayward practices of these young women by describing the world through their eyes.”
Hartman then goes on to say:
“Every historian of the multitude, the dispossessed, the subaltern, and the enslaved is forced to grapple with the power and authority of the archive and the limits it sets on what can be known, whose perspective matters, and who is endowed with the gravity and authority of historical actor.”
I love Hartman’s commentary here. It’s true: history does require us to rely on the record, but the archive is finite. In Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments, Hartman fills in the gaps and notes how the book “breaks open archival documents so they might yield a richer picture of the social upheaval that transformed black social life in the twentieth century.” I must note, that this is also what I aim to do here at Louis Hilton; my objective is to not only document historical events, tell the stories of the everyday people that make history, but also to augment the record with my own life experiences and musings. But back to why I’m really here: Gladys Bentley.
We’re introduced to Gladys in the chapter “Mistah Beauty, the Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Woman, Select Scenes from a Film, Never Cast by Oscar Micheaux, Harlem, 1920s.” In her innovative, lyrical and non-conforming style, Hartman introduces us to Gladys Bentley. I was immediately captivated. Who was this gender-nonconforming child born in Philly? Who was this entertainer who donned men’s suits on stage in the 1930s? Who was this individual who led out loud with their queerness at such a precarious time?
I immediately conducted my own research on Gladys and some of their performances. I wanted to know about their ties to the midwest and immediately looked up whether they had performed in my adopted hometown of Detroit. I stumbled upon this section of the June 4, 1936 edition of the Detroit Tribune. The Detroit Tribune promoted itself as “the leading Negro weekly in Michigan,” and was in print for approximately twenty years. The paper often included images of the Harlem Renaissance which was all the rage across Black America.
The Brown Bomber, Joe Louis, Detroit’s son and Black America’s hero, took center stage. At the bottom of the article is the title “They Make Harlem Laugh and Relax,” and there is Gladys Bentley with her troupe of fellow entertainers. I would love to have seen them perform. From the photo it appears as if they stood in their unique space, were ahead of their time, and paved the way for others to be seen and heard.
In describing Gladys, Hartman says “he conceded no ground,” and I must agree. They were a pioneer in their own right, deciding to live in their truth and on their own terms. Langston Hughes extolled Bentley as “an amazing exhibition of musical energy - a large, dark, masculine lady, whose feet pounded the floor while her fingers pounded the keyboard - a perfect piece of African sculpture, animated by her own rhythm.”
Towards the end of their life, I believe Gladys bowed to societal pressure, choosing to live their life in a more conventional way that was more palpable to society at the time. Feel free to look it up, but I’ve decided to focus my time here on highlighting who Gladys was at their zenith.
For the past month, we’ve celebrated and recognized LGBTQ+ pioneers and trailblazers: Gladys is indubitably one. They made history at a time when living in their truth was especially dangerous and life threatening. For me, they are an example and a reminder of one of my favorite mantras: no one knows you better than you. Our goal in life is to be ourselves and to live our truth out loud. To me, that’s what PRIDE is all about; let’s celebrate it even as June comes to a close.
In addition to reading Wayward Lives, I encourage you to read the following books by LGBTQ+ authors. All are powerful narratives that you can, and should, read beyond June.
Unprotected: A Memoir, by Billy Porter
Over the Top: A Raw Journey to Self-Love, by Jonathan Van Ness
Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More, by Janet Mock
Fire Shut Up in My Bones, by Charles Blow