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Music during the Harlem Renaissance influenced the work of
Essay about Literary Critique of Langston Hughes
Langstone hughes and black american experience
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Langston Hughes was known as the most popular and versatile writes that was connected to the Harlem Renaissance. His main goal was to try an capture the oral and improvisatory traditions of black culture in the form of writing. He grew up around racism which influenced him to become more deeply rooted in his culture. After he published his first volumes of poems in 1962 he went on to writing a very important essay called, "The Negro Artist and The Racial Mountain". In this writing he described in great detail the challenges he had to face being a black artist who produced racial art. Though it was frowned upon he encouraged other artist to make the same attempt. Langston Hughes' work is well influenced by the Harlem Renaissance because it was time African Americans would celebrate and it opened artistic possibilities to the writers. These included drawing …show more content…
It was a time when cultural pride exploded; the birth of African American Culture was reborn. During this time African American writers, actors and musicians stood up for their rights through their art. Langton Hughes work was influenced by this because he wrote in such a way that it gave off the rhythmic meter of blues and jazz. He used jazz because jazz was the main part of the Harlem Renaissance that shaped America and the entire world. It allowed some of the African American works to be noticed or it would have been lost or never produced (U.S. History). A few of his poem showed this rhythm such as, The Weary Blues. This poem was especially influenced by the Harlem Renaissance because it mimicked the traditional form of twelve-bar blues. Also because it displayed southern dialect, crooning diction and syncopated rhythm (Learner.org). In this poem he talks about the blues a person is playing and describing what his body movements, tone of voice and his the old man may be experiencing while singing these blues (Langston
Langston Hughes was a large influence on the African-American population of America. Some of the ways he did this was how his poetry influenced Martin Luther King Jr. and the Harlem Renaissance. These caused the civil rights movement that resulted in African-Americans getting the rights that they deserved in the United States. Hughes was born in 1902 in Joplin, Missouri. His parents divorced when he was young and his grandmother raised him. She got him into literature and education; she was one of the most important influences on him. He moved around a lot when he was young, due to his parents divorce, but remained a good student and graduated high school. After this he traveled the world and worked in different places, all the things he saw in his travels influenced him. In 1924 he settled down in Harlem where he became one of the important figures in the Harlem Renaissance. He enjoyed listening to blues and jazz in clubs while he wrote his poetry. The music that he enjoyed greatly influenced the style and rhythm of his poetry. The poem “Dream Variations” by Hughes is about an average African-American who dreams of a world where African-Americans are not looked at or treated differently and they can rest peacefully. Yet in real life this was not so, black people and white people were not equal. And the world was not as forgiving and nice as in their dream. This poem is a good example of Hughes writing because it is typical of three things. The first is the common theme of the average life of an African-American and their struggles. Secondly, the style of his writing which is based on the rhythm of jazz and blues- he uses a lot of imagery and similes. Lastly, his influences which are his lonely childhood and growing up as an Afric...
Langston Hughes wrote during a very critical time in American History, the Harlem Renaissance. Hughes wrote many poems, but most of his most captivating works centered around women and power that they hold. They also targeted light and darkness and strength. The Negro Speaks of Rivers and Mother to Son, both explain the importance of the woman, light and darkness and strength in the African-American community. They both go about it in different ways.
“The Weary Blues” speaks of a person hearing a Negro playing the blues on a piano “Down on Lenox Avenue the other night,”. The poem is centered around this event, explaining “He did a lazy sway…He did a lazy sway…” It seems that Hughes was addressing the common link of Negro’s, urban life, and the blues music seventy years ago; quite a different approach than his other work.
Poetry was a big part of the Harlem Renaissance, especially black poetry. Poetry helped people get their emotions out and provided an outlet for many new and old African-Americans, and for Africans just arriving in the United States in Harlem. The Renaissance was filled with great poets including the great Langston Hughes. Hughes is the author of his own book The Weary Blues and the writer of the poems Not without Laughter and The Way of the White Folks. He believed in the beauty of the Africans, as stated on Shmoop “Hughes knew that black was beautiful.” He won the Harlem gold medal for literature for his literary work and helped shape the artists of the Harlem Renaissances contributions to the movement. Hughes was also the founder of three theaters meant as outlets for black actors and dramatists. The names of these theaters are the New Negro Theater, Langston Hughes Preforming Arts, and Black Arts (“Langston Hughes Founded Theaters”). Langston Hughes was a very popular and
Poetry was another prominent form of expression during the Harlem Renaissance era. Poetry served as another form of self expression for African-Americans, similar to that of Jazz and the Blues. This form of media served the same (or a very much similar) as music did, Some notable poets include the likes of Langston Hughes, who is considered by some to be one of the most important and influential Harlem Renaissance poets of the time, James Weldon Johnson, and Claude McKay. Most notable of the three is, poet and intellectual, Langston Hughes who , in addition to writing books and plays, served to spread the emotions of African-Americans as well as himself and to make clear the ambitions and dreams of the American people within the United States. As Stated by Concordia Online Education, ”Hughes wrote novels, plays and short stories, but it is his emotional, heartfelt poems that expressed the common experiences of the culture of black people for which he is most
“Poetry is the rhythmical creation of beauty in words.” –Edgar Allan Poe. Poetry is one of the world’s greatest wonders. It is a way to tell a story, raise awareness of a social or political issue, an expression of emotions, an outlet, and last but not least it is an art. Famous poet Langston Hughes uses his poetry as a musical art form to raise awareness of social injustices towards African-Americans during the time of the Harlem Renaissance. Although many poets share similarities with one another, Hughes creatively crafted his poetry in a way that was only unique to him during the 1920’s. He implemented different techniques and styles in his poetry that not only helped him excel during the 1920’s, but has also kept him relative in modern times. Famous poems of his such as a “Dream Deferred,” and “I, Too, Sing America” are still being studied and discussed today. Due to the cultural and historical events occurring during the 1920’s Langston Hughes was able to implement unique writing characteristics such as such as irregular use of form, cultural and historical referenced themes and musical influences such as Jazz and the blues that is demonstrative of his writing style. Langston Hughes use of distinct characteristics such as irregular use of form, cultural and historical referenced themes and musical influences such as Jazz and the blues helped highlight the plights of African-Americans during the Harlem Renaissance Era.
When reading the literature of Langston Hughes, I cant help but feeling energetically charged and inspired. Equality, freedom, empowerment, renaissance, justice and perseverance, are just a taste of the subject matter Hughes offers. He amplifies his voice and beliefs through his works which are firmly rooted in race pride and race feeling. Hughes committed himself both to writing and to writing mainly about African Americans. His early love for the “wonderful world of books” was sparked by loneliness and parental neglect. He would soon lose himself in the works of Walt Whitman, Paul Laurence, Carl Sandburg and other literary greats which would lead to enhancing his ever so growing style and grace of oeuvre. Such talent, character, and willpower could only come from one’s life experiences. Hughes had allot to owe to influences such as his grandmother and great uncle John Mercer Langston - a famous African American abolitionist. These influential individuals helped mold Hughes, and their affect shines brightly through his literary works of art.
During the 1920's and 30’s, America went through a period of astonishing artistic creativity, the majority of which was concentrated in one neighborhood of New York City, Harlem. The creators of this period of growth in the arts were African-American writers and other artists. Langston Hughes is considered to be one of the most influential writers of the period know as the Harlem Renaissance. With the use of blues and jazz Hughes managed to express a range of different themes all revolving around the Negro. He played a major role in the Harlem Renaissance, helping to create and express black culture. He also wrote of political views and ideas, racial inequality and his opinion on religion. I believe that Langston Hughes’ poetry helps to capture the era know as the Harlem Renaissance.
The literature appealed to the whites and African-American middle class. As important as these literary outlets were, the Renaissance relied massively on white publishing houses and white-owned magazines. A major achievement of the Renaissance was to open the door to mainstream white publishing houses and periodicals, although the relationship between the Renaissance writers and white publishers and audiences started some controversy. W. E. B. Du Bois didn’t oppose the relationship between black writers and white publishers, but he was condemning of works, such as Claude McKay 's bestselling book Home to Harlem (1928) for engaging to the prurient demands of white readers and publishers for portrayals of black debauchery. Langston Hughes communicated for most of the artist and writers when he wrote his essay The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain (1926) that black artists prepared to express themselves no matter what the white public or black public thought. In Langston Hughes ' writings, he also repeated to the theme of racial fleeting, but during the Harlem Renaissance, he began to analyze the topic of homosexuality and homophobia. He began to use unruly language in his writings. He analyzed this topic because it was a point that during this time period was not discussed.
Langston Hughes was probably the most well-known literary force during the Harlem Renaissance. He was one of the first known black artists to stress a need for his contemporaries to embrace the black jazz culture of the 1920s, as well as the cultural roots in Africa and not-so-distant memory of enslavement in the United States. In formal aspects, Hughes was innovative in that other writers of the Harlem Renaissance stuck with existing literary conventions, while Hughes wrote several poems and stories inspired by the improvised, oral traditions of black culture (Baym, 2221). Proud of his cultural identity, but saddened and angry about racial injustice, the content of much of Hughes’ work is filled with conflict between simply doing as one is told as a black member of society and standing up for injustice and being proud of one’s identity. This relates to a common theme in many of Hughes’ poems: that dignity is something that has to be fought for by those who are held back by segregation, poverty, and racial bigotry.
Hughes, who claimed Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Carl Sandburg, and Walt Whitman as his primary influences, is particularly known for his insightful, colorful portrayals of black life in America from the twenties through the sixties. He wrote novels, short stories and plays, as well as poetry, and is also known for his engagement with the world of jazz and the influence it had on his writing, as in "Montage of a Dream Deferred." His life and work were enormously important in shaping the artistic contributions of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. Unlike other notable black poets of the period—Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, and Countee Cullen—Hughes refused to differentiate between his personal experience and the common experience of black America. He wanted to tell the stories of his people in ways that reflected their actual culture, including both their suffering and their love of music, laughter, and language itself.
“Harlem” by Langston Hughes opened the doors to African American art. Throughout history, there has been a lot of issues with racial inequality. During the Harlem Renaissance, many African Americans wanted to prove they were just as intelligent, creative, and talented as white Americans. Langston Hughes was one of the people who played an influential part in the Harlem Renaissance. His poem “Harlem” painted a very vivid picture of his life and his outlook on the society he lived in.
Langston Hughes was deemed the "Poet Laureate of the Negro Race," a fitting title which the man who fueled the Harlem Renaissance deserved. But what if looking at Hughes within the narrow confines of the perspective that he was a "black poet" does not fully give him credit or fully explain his works? What if one actually stereotypes Hughes and his works by these over-general definitions that cause readers to look at his poetry expecting to see "blackness?" Any person's unique experiences in life and the sense of personal identity this forms most definitely affects the way he or she views the world. This molded view of the world can, in turn, be communicated by the person through artistic expression. Taking this logic into account, to more fully comprehend the message and force of Hughes' poetry one must look, not just to his work, but also at the experiences in his life that constructed his ideas about society and his own identity. In looking at Hughes' biography, one studies his struggle to form a self-identity that reflected both his African American and mainstream white cultural influence; consequently, this mixing of black and white identity that occurred throughout Hughes' life is reflected in his poem "The Weary Blues."
The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement where African American poets were writing about the racial tension they experience. Most poems came from Harlem and were about the injustices and pride the black community felt. One famous poet was Langston Hughes. Hughes works were about the African American life starting in the twenties. Langston Hughes was the best writer of the Harlem Renaissance. He wanted his poems to the point and simple, rather than complex and wordy. His works were not written in sonnet like many other black poets. He believes that poem from African American poet should be different from their experiences. He wanted to tell real stories that including good and bad times that happen. His poems spoke to people everywhere, especially in the African American community. One of his poems goes over a hard time an African American would have to face when living under a landlord. Through the words in “Ballad of the LandLord” by Langston Hughes, themes of social injustices in the African American communities show the audience how African Americans were treated.
Some critics claim that Langston Hughes depicted an ugly representation of black life in his poetry, but these poems exhibit the truth. The legacy of Langston Hughes’ writings has had a profound effect on American literature. He was one of the first African American poets. Due to his published success, he broke through the racial barrier in this country. During the Civil Rights Movement, he continued to write poetry and collections of works that demonstrated the hardship of blacks during the time. In his poems Ku Klux, Harlem, and Merry-Go-Round, Hughes shows the prominence of racial abuse, lack of opportunity, and segregation in African American life. The poetry of Langston Hughes impacted American culture by increasing awareness of the actual trials encountered by the African American population in America during this time period.