Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Langston Hughes
In reading the Hughes poems I was glad to find that they weren't as difficult to understand as some of the other poetry we have read. He seems to keep his poems relatively simple and to the point, but they are still very good poems. One poem that I thought was great was"America" on page 52. I was surprised to see that this poem wasn't directled only at African Americans. This poem encompases all races "darky baby, Jew baby, little outcast". It seems as though Hughes has written it for all those people in the US that feel oppressed and racially segregated. It is about class struggle and the idea that things aren't always accessible to all classes. The poem also discusses the American dream. The narrator speaks about "dream of my dreams" and "seeking the stars". America is see as the land of opportunity, but as we see in the writing, this dream is not accessible to all. I think that Hughes does a great job in this poem of integrating more than one race into his writing and showing the similar struggle that they all face.
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I was also surprised then when he wrote these poems it wasn't just about the black race as all the other writers have been. It really is about all those who are oppressed. I think it is refreshing to see this type of writing. Not that I am downplaying what happened to the African Americans and all because was horrible but others were treated badly too for not being white and we can finally see that in his writing.
Although Langston Hughes bases most of the poems around African Americans and their struggle through slavery and segregation, he also writes about Jews, Native Americans, and immigrants. In "Let American Be America Again" he mentions the reasons why immigrants left Poland, Ireland, England, and Africa and how they were searching for a new and better life in America. Hughes also writes about the poor white farmer and Indians that want to be free, own land, and bring back the American dream.
This was another one of my favorite poems we read in class. I found his writing to be quick and to the point. In this poem I really liked the short sentences in the start/end and the long sentences in the middle. I liked how this poem had a universal theme that could apply to not only African Americans, but to any one who has been oppressed.
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