Transitioning Of A Silhouette During the years of the 1920 's through the early 1930 's, African Americans established themselves artistically, culturally and socially. This intellectual period was known as the Harlem Renaissance. The period of the Harlem Renaissance brought together black authors, musicians, and poets. One of the most notable poets of this era was Langston Hughes. Langston Hughes is considered one of leaders of this period. He 's famously known for his controversial bodies of work. One of the most controversial poems created by Hughes is his poem called "Silhouette". Silhouette was written in 1936, where racial segregation and prejudice was emphasized. What makes this piece of work so controversial is how the tone within the poem takes a drastic turn when the speaker and gender are changed. This paper will analyze the ambiguous meanings of the poem once the speakers identity is transitioned. This poem focuses on the lynching of a African American male. The speaker of the poem appears to console a woman who appears to be distressed due to the events taking place. In the first four lines of stanza 1, the speaker says: Southern gentle lady,
Do not swoon.
They 've just hung a black man
In the dark of the moon. (1-4)
During the time this poem was written, racism and prejudice towards African Americans was prevalent and habituated to whites. From the first stanza alone, the tone is already set as uncharitable and
In conclusion, the poem was used as a key to unlock some of the thoughts the negro had concerning Africa. The negro in this poem was a representative of all negroes during this time; their thoughts and the their feelings toward Africa. Cullen’s usage of the literary devices allow for an effective expression of the meaning of this poem. Poems are intensified language of experience, so the devices assured the connection of the reader to the poem and the experience. This applies to many issues in society today because as beautiful as our country is there are still dark clouds that cover the very essence of what the states once stood
Both Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes were great writers but their attitudes towards their personal experience as an African American differed in many ways. These differences can be attributed to various reasons that range from gender to life experience but even though they had different perceptions regarding the African American experience, they both shared one common goal, racial equality through art. To accurately delve into the minds of the writers’ one must first consider authors background such as their childhood experience, education, as well their early adulthood to truly understand how it affected their writing in terms the similarities and
Langston Hughes is one the most renowned and respected authors of twentieth century America not simply one of the most respected African-American authors, though he is certainly this as well, but one of the most respected authors of the period overall. A large part of the respect and admiration that the man and his work have garnered is due to the richness an complexity of Hughes' writing, both his poetry and his prose and even his non-fictions. In almost all of his texts, Hughes manages at once to develop and explore the many intricacies and interactions of the human condition and specifically of the experience growing up and living as a black individual in a white-dominated and explicitly anti-Black society while at the same time, while at the same time rendering his human characters and their emotions in a simple, straightforward, and immensely accessible fashion. Reading the complexity behind the surface simplicity of his works is at once enjoyable and edifying.
The Harlem Renaissance was an evolutionary period in terms of African-American cultural expression; in fact, the movement changed the way that black musicians, poets, authors, and even ordinary people perceived themselves. One of the most influential poets of the time was Langston Hughes. Hughes’ works display a pride in being black that most African-Americans are too afraid to show, even today. Moreover, he adamantly refused to submit to the sentiment that he should be ashamed of his heritage, instead believing that “no great poet has ever been afraid of being himself.”(p1990 From the Negro Artist). In the article “‘Don’t Turn Back’: Langston Hughes, Barack Obama, and Martin Luther King, Jr.” by Jason Miller, Miller analyzes how Hughes’ poetry has been used by Martin Luther King, Jr. and Barack Obama and how the House of Un-american Activities Committee affected that use.
This is a poem that is mainly directed to the violence that was often experienced by children with an African-American ethnicity. The violence was mainly experienced on the streets where a majority of these children lived.
In the poem, “Lynching Song”, a black man is being hanged by a group of white men. And although he might have died, he states that the whit men are the ones who are really dead. The reader captures the true meaning of the poem through the formal features that are being presented. In the five-stanza poem, there are four lines in the first two stanzas; three in the next two, and the last stanza only has one line. Not all the lines are the same beat either, in the first stanza the first two lines have four beats and the next two lines have five beats. In the second stanza, the first line has three beats and the following three lines have five beats. The third stanza has three consecutive four beat meters, and the fourth stanza starts with three
Race plays a big part in this poem. He speaks on Harlem and its culture and this environment but also about mutual interest with people
All three of the poems discussed in this essay relate to the struggles suffered by African Americans in the late 18th century to the early 19th century in many different ways. They had to live under harsh
Throughout the poem, the author chooses simple diction. This makes the tone straightforward and blunt, like a black America who simply expresses himself instead of sermonizing about discrimination. Thereby, readers can accept the poem’s argument more easily. Furthermore, the author writes the poem mostly in long sentences to emphasize on short yet important sentences such as “That’s America.”, “Be we are. That’s true!”
During the 1920’s a new movement began to arise. This movement known as the Harlem Renaissance expressed the new African American culture. The new African American culture was expressed through the writing of books, poetry, essays, the playing of music, and through sculptures and paintings. Three poems and their poets express the new African American culture with ease. (Jordan 848-891) The poems also express the position of themselves and other African Americans during this time. “You and Your Whole Race”, “Yet Do I Marvel”, and “The Lynching” are the three poems whose themes are the same. The poets of these poems are, as in order, Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, and Claude Mckay.
This paper examines the perspective of Langston Hughes and how his style of writing is. It looks at how several interrelated themes run through the poetry of Langston Hughes, all of which have to do with being black in America and surviving in spite of immense difficulties. Langston Hughes is one of the most influential writers because his style of work not only captured the situation of African Americans; it also grabbed the attention of other races with the use of literary elements and other stylistic qualities. Langston Hughes became well known for his way of interpreting music into his work of writing, which readers love and enjoy today.
He states he is twenty-two years old, I’m sure referring to his age. He then goes onto say that he is colored, which I assume means he is dark skinned. He says he’s from Winston-Salem, which I know is located in North Carolina. At the time this poem was written, in 1951, racism played a huge part in everyday life. Moving onto line eight and nine, he lets us know that he attended more than one schools. He describes the location of one of the schools. The first school he attended was in his home town in North Carolina. Then, in Durham, and afterwards to the college he received this assignment from, “on the hill above Harlem.” Also, I know Harlem is in New York so the college must be too. Line ten describes he is the only colored student in his class and that there was a huge racial barrier between colored and non-colored people. Showing in line eleven through fifteen shows us what routes he has to take to go home. He purposely uses five verses to list his walk home. I can tell that he does not live close the college as the other students might have. During that time he probably lived in the ghetto. Moving on to line sixteen “It’s not
The poem was really powerful in part because of the hostile era during the early and late 1940s where being near white women was forbidden and for which several African Americans especially in the South were lynched or brutally punished. This aspect grabbed the essential audience and created the perfect atmosphere to deliver his message through the poem, because all
This poem is written from the perspective of an African-American from a foreign country, who has come to America for the promise of equality,
Credited as being the most recognizable figure of the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes played a vital role in the Modernist literary movement and the movement to revitalize African American culture in the early 20th century. Hughes’s poems reflect his personal struggle and the collective struggle of African Americans during this cultural revival.