John Oliver Killens

John Oliver Killens (January 14, 1916 – October 27, 1987) was an American fiction writer from Georgia. His novels featured elements of African-American life. In his debut novel, Youngblood, Killens coined the phrase "kicking ass and taking names". He also wrote plays, short stories and essays, and published articles in a range of outlets.

Early life and education Killens was born in Macon, Georgia, to Charles Myles Killens Sr. and Willie Lee Killens.

Aspiring to become a lawyer, Killens attended several historically black colleges and universities between 1934 and 1936: Edward Waters College in Jacksonville, Florida; Morris Brown College in Atlanta, Georgia; Howard University in Washington, D.C.; and Robert H. Terrell Law School in Washington, D.C.

His first novel, Youngblood (1954), dealing with a black Georgia family in the early 1900s, was read and developed at HWG meetings in members' homes. In his book, he first coined the expression "kicking ass and taking names".

Killens was a founding member of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee.

Killens's second novel, And Then We Heard the Thunder (1962), was about the treatment of the black soldiers in the military during World War II, when the armed forces were still segregated. Critic Noel Perrin ranked it as one of five major works of fiction of World War II.

In The Cotillion; or, One Good Bull Is Half the Herd (1971), Killens explored upper-class African-American society. According to Kira Alexander, "On June 7, 1964, Killens reached his largest audience when his essay 'Explanation of the "Black Psyche" was published in the New York Times Sunday Magazine." He produced five further articles, which were published in his 1965 collection Black Man's Burden. Named in the author's honor, The Killens Review of Arts & Letters is published twice a year by the center.

Personal life

On June 19, 1943, Killens married Grace Ward Jones. They had two children together: a son, Jon Charles (born 1944), and a daughter, Barbara (born 1947).

In 1987, Killens died of cancer, aged 71, at the Metropolitan Jewish Geriatric Center in Brooklyn, New York. He was living in Crown Heights.