The Big Sea

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The Big Sea is Langston Hughes’s autobiography, published in 1940. It covers his late teens and twenties as he moves between the United States, Mexico, and Europe, showing what life was like for a Black writer in the early 20th century.

Hughes grows up mostly with his mother after his father leaves for Mexico. Poverty and racism shape his early life, but he learns from these experiences and channels them into his writing. He supports himself with various jobs, teaches English, and travels on ships that take him around the world. He spends time in Paris and other parts of Europe, where the Jazz Age feeds his love of music and helps shape his poetic voice. Finding stable work and money is hard, especially for a Black artist who isn’t a performer, but he keeps writing and publishing.

Back in the United States, Hughes attends Lincoln University on a scholarship and pushes for Black faculty at a Black college. He writes his first book, Not Without Laughter, with help from a donor who at first seems supportive but later proves prejudiced; Hughes challenges her and ends up losing that funding. He settles in Harlem as the 1920s fade, becoming a major voice in the Harlem Renaissance and feeling a strong sense of connection with Black writers and artists of his era.

The Big Sea closes with Hughes winning the Hammond Award in 1931, which he says helped his career and inspired future Black writers. The book maps his experiences in the United States and abroad, the racism he faced, the people he met, and his rising fame as a writer. Critics praise its vivid portrait of the era and its insight into the Harlem Renaissance, even as it leaves some of Hughes’s inner feelings less explored.