Page 14 - Florida Sentinel 4-19-19

News From Around The Nation
The 2019 Pulitzer Prize Winners Are Brimming With Black Excellence And A Posthumous Appearance By Aretha Franklin
A Pulitzer Prize is kind of a big deal.
As the most prestigious award in American journalism, literature and music, it’s not quite a BET Hip-Hop Award, but it sure warrants an update to your Twitter bio and your an- nual salary.
Since its auspicious arrival in 1917, this distinction—named
after legendary newspaper pub- lisher Joseph Pulitzer—has bestowed the illustrious title of “Pulitzer Prize winner” to only the best and the brightest, as the rest of us mere mortals can only watch in admiration and awe until our own time comes.
On Monday, Prize administra- tor Dana Canedy announced the latest collection of recipients
at Columbia University in New York City. Those who are among elite company—as there was plenty of black excellence to be found.
Aretha Franklin, the undis- puted Queen of Soul, was awarded a posthumous Pulitzer for her decades of “indelible contribution to American music and culture.”
“Many of us this year [...] have been reflecting on the impact of Aretha,” Canedy told The Root. “She’s special. And her impact on the country is some- thing we’ve been reflecting on since her death. It just seemed appropriate to show her R-E-S- P-E-C-T.”
Additional winners who were celebrated for their
melanin magic include:
• Cartoonist Darrin Bell for his “beautiful and daring edito- rial cartoons that took on issues affecting disenfranchised com- munities, calling out lies, hypocrisy and fraud in the polit- ical turmoil surrounding the Trump administration.”
• New York Times scribe Brent Staples for “editorials written with extraordinary moral clarity that charted the racial fault lines in the United States at a polarizing moment in the nation’s history.”
• Fairview playwright Jackie Sibblies Drury for creating “a hard-hitting drama that examines race in a highly conceptual, layered structure, ultimately bringing audiences into the actors’ community to face deep-seated prejudices.”
• The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke author Jeffrey C. Stewart for creating “a panoramic view of the personal trials and artistic triumphs of the father of the Harlem Renais- sance and the movement he in- spired.”
Former CNN Reporter To Be Airlifted Home For Burial After Collapsing
SONI METHU
Former CNN reporter Soni Methu’s body will be airlifted on Sunday for burial.
Methu, who died on Thursday while on the way to the hospital in Diani, will be buried at her par- ents’ home in Eldoret on Tuesday, April 23.
There will be wakes in Diani and Nairobi organized by family and friends before the burial to cele- brate Methu’s life.
The former international journalist died after a sudden ill- ness and a post-mortem examina- tion has been scheduled for Wednesday to determine the cause of death.
Methu had taken ill at 6pm when she cried in pain while clutching her stomach and died 30 minutes later on the way to the hospital.
Her former employer CNN in a statement sent out condolences to her family.
Methu joined CNN in 2014 as the host of Inside Africa and left early 2016 when the show format changed.
She joined China Global Tele- vision Network (CGTN) until re- cently when she ceased working for the network.
PAGE 2-B FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY AND FRIDAY FRIDAY, APRIL 19, 2019