In 1985, SIUE alumna and poet Darlene Duncan Swanson Roy (B.A. ’65, Sociology) began meeting with fellow alumni, including Eugene Redmond (B.A. ’64, M.A. ’65, English), Sherman Fowler (B.S. ’72, Mass Communications; M.S.E.D. ’76), Frank Nave (B.A. ’64, Speech Pathology; M.S.E.D. ’68), Sandra Reynolds (Alima Afsal) (B.S. ’91, Speech Communication), Evon Udoh (B.A. ’75, M.S. ’76, Speech Pathology) and the late John Cobb (B.A. ’73, Philosophy), among others, in an effort to form vigorous literary programming among metro east writers, artists and cultural workers.

Roy has now served as president of the Eugene B. Redmond Writers Club for 20 years.  The club, which she says “offers aid and comfort, and occasional discomfort, to writers,” focuses on the development of writers within the context of their cultural backgrounds.

Roy works as an associate editor of the club’s literary magazine, “Drumvoices Revue,” published collaboratively with SIUE, while she assists with planning and executing such annual programs as “Break Word with the World,” Pre-Kwanzaa Ritual, The East St. Louis Cultural History Project, Black History and Literary Forum, Fresh and Ancestral, and Drumvoices Festival of the Arts.

The group initially started meeting at the urging of Redmond, who had just returned home after 16 years of traveling, writing and teaching in various parts of the United States and world.  At the time, he was serving as a special assistant to the superintendent for cultural and language arts in the East St. Louis public school district.

After nearly a year of planning cultural-literary community programming, the group officially named the club after Redmond by majority vote in March 1986.  It wasn’t until November of that year, however, that the club was chartered, with charter members including Redmond, Roy and Fowler.

When it first formed, the club maintained a local focus, even while it had begun to add national literary-cultural figures, such as Maya Angelou, Quincy Troupe, Margaret Walker Alexander and Gwendolyn Brooks, to its board of trustees.  While members were and continue to be primarily African American, the club has broadened beyond its metro east members over the years to include about 50 percent St. Louis residents.

Since SIUE appointed Redmond professor of English in 1990, the club has collaborated with SIUE in sponsoring cultural-literary events and publishing projects such as “Drumvoices Revue.”

In 1995, the club developed the Kwansaba, an original poetic form that is a 49-word poem spread across seven lines, with seven words on each line and no words longer than seven letters (unless it is a proper noun or a foreign term).  The form evolved from the club’s practice of writing poems for each of the seven Kwanzaa principles during its Pre-Kwanzaa Celebration.  Members then began to use the form to write about other subjects throughout the year, and the Kwansaba is now widely used by poets throughout the United States and Nigeria.

While Roy dedicated decades to both her personal development as a poet and the club’s cultural-literary programming, she earned her living as a public servant.  After receiving her bachelor’s in sociology with a concentration in social welfare, Roy received a master’s degree in social work from St. Louis University in 1971.  She then worked for the State of Illinois in the Department of Public Aid, which became the Department of Human Services in 1997, for 37 years.  Over the years, Roy’s position evolved from caseworker, supervisor, assistant administrator, to director of the East St. Louis office by the time she retired in December 2004.

In addition to serving as president of the writers club, Roy continues to serve on several boards and to hone her skills as a recognized poet.  Her chapbook, “Soon One Morning and other Poems,” was published by River King Poetry Press in 2001, and she is in the beginning stages of publishing her first full book of poems.  Roy’s poetry has further been published in numerous periodicals and anthologies, while two of her poems were featured on Bi-State Transit’s Metro Link trains and buses for a three-month period in 1994 and 2004, respectively.

Roy says that each poem she has written has added to her consciousness and enhanced her abilities as a poet, regardless of whether it was published.  For her, the measure of success isn’t found in awards or publications but rather the sheer enjoyment others take away from her poems.

Like all writers, however, Roy faced many rejections before she found her niche and perspective as a poet.  “Rejection helped me not to take myself and my work so seriously,” Roy said.  “It helped to unleash my inner critical acumen, and it strengthened the overall quality of my poetry.”

After graduating from the East St. Louis public school system, Roy said that it was at SIUE that she realized she was “truly intelligent, was capable of competing with the best students and of holding my own.”  When she first enrolled at the East S. Louis Center, better known as “Tenth Street Tech,” in September 1963, Roy said it was a major turning point in her life.  “SIUE provided a great education, a chance to meet students from other countries or cultures and an opportunity to expand my view of the world,” she said.

While at “Tenth Street Tech,” Roy met Redmond, who was working as the student editor of the Alestle.  “Of course, I did not know that Redmond would play such an important role much later in my life when he, Sherman Fowler and I would become the charter members of the Eugene B. Redmond Writers Club in 1986,” Roy said.

Today, Redmond is schedule to retire from SIUE this August, but he will continue working with the writers club in both a hands-on and advisory capacity.  “As I’m easing out, we’ll continue to ready new leadership and strengthen some of the more seasoned leaders like Darlene Roy,” he said.

Redmond predicts that the club will play an enormous role in the future of the literary community.  Plans include publications, writing contests, literary events featuring local and visiting writers, travel to conferences and festivals, audience development and rich involvement with public and private schools.

Aspiring writers would do well to join a writers club, such as the Eugene B. Redmond Writers Club.  By joining such a group, Roy said writers would learn various writing styles, poetic devices, tools needed for their craft, the art of reviewing others’ works and how to accept critical analysis of their own works.  Above all, however, she stressed “it is most important to read all types of literature to realize the kinds of poetry and other works that have been written across the ages and across the world.”

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