Paul Robeson — singer; actor; activist with roots in the USSR
Paul Leroy Robeson was born in Princeton, New Jersey, on 9 April 1898, the son of William Drew Robeson, a formerly enslaved man who became a Presbyterian minister, and Maria Louisa Bustill. He had no Russian ancestry. He enters the archive as a cultural connection: for decades he was one of the most celebrated foreign artists in the Soviet Union.
He won a scholarship to Rutgers College, where he was an All-America football player, and took a law degree at Columbia in 1923, but finding little opportunity for a Black lawyer he turned to the stage. He made his London debut in 1922, caused a sensation in Eugene O'Neill's The Emperor Jones in New York and London, and in 1928 sang Ol' Man River as Joe in the London production of Show Boat, the song that became his signature. He lived in London for several years, played Othello there in 1930, and appeared in films including The Emperor Jones (1933), Sanders of the River (1935), Show Boat (1936) and The Proud Valley (1940).
In 1934, while studying African languages in London, he was invited to Moscow by the film director Sergei Eisenstein, who wanted him for an unrealised film about the Haitian Revolution. Robeson said that in the Soviet Union, for the first time in his life, he felt he was not judged by the colour of his skin. He returned many times, gave concerts across the country, and enrolled his son, Paul Jr., in a Moscow school. He became an outspoken supporter of the Soviet Union and of left-wing and anti-fascist causes.
Back in New York he played Othello again in 1943-44, in what was then the longest-running Shakespeare production in Broadway history. In 1950 the State Department withdrew his passport after he refused to sign an affidavit disclaiming Communist Party membership, and his career in the United States contracted sharply. In 1952 he was awarded the Stalin Peace Prize, which he could accept only in 1958, when a Supreme Court ruling allowed his passport to be restored. That year he published his autobiography, Here I Stand, and he then spent several years performing in Europe and the Soviet Union, where he was received with great honour.
He returned to the United States in 1963 and lived quietly with his sister in Philadelphia, where he died on 23 January 1976, aged seventy-seven.
"Lived in London for several years from 1928; first visited Moscow in 1934 and returned repeatedly; his son attended school in Moscow; after his passport was restored in 1958 lived and performed in Europe and the Soviet Union before returning to the United States."
Migration storyTracing the roots — Princeton, New Jersey (born); repeated stays in the USSR from 1934
No Russian ancestry. Invited to Moscow by Sergei Eisenstein in 1934, he returned repeatedly, enrolled his son in a Moscow school and became one of the best-known foreign artists in the Soviet Union; he was awarded the Stalin Peace Prize in 1952.
No Russian ancestry. Son of William Drew Robeson, a formerly enslaved man who became a Presbyterian minister, and Maria Louisa Bustill.
Princeton, New Jersey (born); repeated stays in the USSR from 1934. At the time, this region was one of the fifteen republics of the Soviet Union.