The Prosaic Soul of Nikki Giovanni

Sacred Cows and Other Edibles (1988) received the Ohioana Library Award. In it Nikki’s esays and articles take on the loftiness of higher education and personal major life crises.

In Gemini (1971), Giovanni explores one of the most tumultuous periods in our history. Her essays take us from her childhood in Knoxville, Tennessee, through her work in the Black revolution of the sixties, to her emergence as an acclaimed poet. Nikki interweaves warm recollections of her personal history with incisive vignettes of cultural and political history, including her often surprising opinions of Amiri Baraka, Angela Davis, Lena Horne, Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown and others.

For the first time, the collected prose of national treasure Nikki Giovanni

Gemini: An Extended Autobiographical Statement on My First Twenty-Five Years of Being a Black PoetNominated for the National Book Award, this is a journey — both private and public — through the trials and triumphs of 1960s America.

Sacred Cows … And Other EdiblesWinner of the Ohioana Library Award, these fresh and wryly humorous essays explore some of America’s lofty institutions and the poet’s pivotal life experiences.

Racism 101This collection of essays contributes a vital and critical chapter to the debate on American national values.