Was nominated for Broadway's 1977 Tony Award as author of the Best Play
nominee "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow
is Enuf," which featured LaTanya Richardson Jackson as the Woman in
Red.
Biography-bibliography in "Contemporary Authors," New Revision Series,
vol. 131, pp. 395-403. Farmington Hills, MI: Thomson Gale, 2005.
She was one of the first black children to integrate into the all-white public schools of St. Louis, Missouri.
She wrote nearly 50 plays, novels, children's books, and poetry and essay collections.
She adopted a Zulu name in the early 1970s: Ntozake (en-to-ZAH-key), which means "she who comes with her own things," and Shange (SHAHN-gay), meaning "one who walks like a lion".
Her father was a surgeon, and her mother was a psychiatric social worker.
She earned a master's degree in American studies at the University of Southern California. She received a Guggenheim Fellowship and many honors including a Pushcart Prize.
Has one daughter Savannah and one granddaughter.
The cast of her play, "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf," at the Court Theatre in Chicago, Illinois were awarded the 2019 Joseph Jefferson Equity Award for Ensemble (Play).