Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins (May 23, 1859 – August 13, 1930) was an American novelist, journalist, playwright, historian, and editor. A noted contributor to the racial, political, and feminist discourse of the time, Hopkins was among the early-20th-century intellectuals who promoted racial uplift through her writing.
She was a pioneer in her use of the romantic novel to explore social and racial themes, as demonstrated in her first major novel, Contending Forces: A Romance Illustrative of Negro Life North and South. Hopkins edited the Colored American Magazine, among the first periodicals to celebrate African-American culture through short stories, essays, and serial novels. She had connections to other influential African Americans of the time, such as Booker T. Washington and William Wells Brown.
Hopkins spent most of her life in Boston, Massachusetts, where she completed most of her works.
