Sheppard Randolph Edmonds

Sheppard Randolph Edmonds was born in Lawrenceville, Virginia in 1900. He received his bachelor's from Oberlin College in Ohio and his master’s from Columbia University in New York in 1934. Following graduation he was awarded a fellowship to study at the Yale School of Drama, where he spent a year, followed by a year each studying in Dublin and in London.

Edmonds was an important playwright in the Harlem Renaissance and in the “Negro Little Theater” movement, writing plays about the Black working-class experience and the struggles of migration and slavery as a form of cultural and historical education. In 1930 he founded the Intercollegiate Dramatic Association, the first organization dedicated to Black theater education. He taught for periods of time at Morgan College in Baltimore (1926-1934) and Dillard College in New Orleans (1935-1947), both HBCUs. While at Dillard he also organized the Southern Association of Dramatic and Speech Arts in 1935 and served as its president until 1942. He later served as chair of the Department of Speech and Drama at Florida A&M (1948-1968).

Edmonds died in Lawrenceville, Virginia in 1983.

"Job Hunters" in Black Theatre USA: Plays by African Americans 1847 to Today. New York, NY: Free Press, 1996. (originally published in 1922).

Rocky Roads. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1926).

Illicit Love. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1927).

Silas Brown. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1927).

"Some Whys and Wherefores of College Dramatics," The Crisis 37, no. 3 (1930).

The Devil's Prince. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1930).

Everyman's Land. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1930).

Hewers of the Wood. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1930).

The Phantom Treasure. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1930).

Shades and Shadows. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1930).

The Tribal Chief. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1930).

"What Good are College Dramatics," The Crisis 41, no. 8 (1934).

Bad Man. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1934).

Bleeding Hearts. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1934).

Breeders. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1934).

The New Window. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1934).

Old Man Pete. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1934).

Nat Turner. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1935).

For Fatherland. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1935).

Yellow Death. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1935).

"Education in Self-Contempt," The Crisis 45, no. 8 (1938).

"Out-of-date Colleges," The Crisis 45, no. 11 (1938).

"Fraternities at the Crossroads," The Crisis 46, no. 10 (1939).

Gangsters Over Harlem. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1939).

The High Court of Astoria. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1939).

The Land of Cotton. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1941).

The Shadow Across the Path. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1943).

The Shape of Wars to Come. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1943).

Earth and Stars. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1946).

"The Negro Little Theatre Movement," Negro History Bulletin 12, no. 4 (1949).

"Return of the Plantation Tradition," Phylon 10, no. 1 (1949).

Whatever the Battle Be. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1950).

"Social and Religious Drama," Phylon 12, no. 3 (1951).

Prometheus and the Atom. Alexander Street Press (originally published in 1955).

The playmakers in Africa. Self-published, 1959.

"A Suggested Centennial Program for the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History," Negro History Bulletin 24, no. 5 (1961).

"A Suggested Bicentennial Program," Negro History Bulletin 38, no. 4 (1975).