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The negro who speaks of rivers analysis
Langston hughes poetry themes analysis
Langston hughes poetry themes analysis
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Langston Hughes, born February 1, 1902 as James Mercer Langston Hughes in Joplin, Missouri to James Hughes and Carrie Langston grew to become one of the most renowned African-American poets. Langston Hughes’ mother and father soon separated and Hughes began living with his grandmother. As a child and teen Hughes moved around a lot from city to city ending up in Ohio where he lived with his mother. Once in Cleveland, Ohio Hughes interest in poetry began. In school, Hughes became interested in poetry through his teachers. Later in life, Hughes first published work was in ‘The Crisis’ and that is when his career as a poet and his effect on the African American community began. Hughes first published poem was “The Negro Speaks of Rivers”. He …show more content…
The “rivers” in this poem are “...ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins”(ll. 2,3). This starts with showing power the rivers have. The power lies in the age of the rivers. To live as long as the world and longer than humans shows the might of rivers. The rivers are the ancient, wise, and enduring and as the poem continues the speaker compares the rivers to their soul. When the speaker then goes on to talk about how he or she has known these rivers and the speaker compares the rivers to the depth of their soul. In the poem, when the speaker says how their “soul has grown deep like the rivers”(ll. 4) it shows the strength they have as well. The power of the rivers that have lived and been around longer than people had been compared to the growth of their soul and many people are unable to say that because that amount of growth takes time and challenges that have to be preserved through. The speaker then goes on to talk about their experienced with different legendary rivers in Africa and the Mississippi River. They spoke of how they “ bathed in the Euphrates...built [their] hut near the Congo...[and] looked upon the Nile”(ll. 5-7). Talking of the rivers in Africa shows what they have experienced and how they have seen and interacted with rivers that have stories. When the speaker gets to the Mississippi he or she says how they “heard the singing of the Mississippi
James Langston Hughes was born on February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri. He was named after his father, but it was later shortened to just Langston Hughes. He was the only child of James and Carrie Hughes. His family was never happy so he was a lonely youth. The reasons for their unhappiness had as much to do with the color of their skin and the society into which they had been born as they did with their opposite personalities. They were victims of white attitudes and discriminatory laws. They moved to Oklahoma in the late 1890s. Although the institution of slavery was officially abolished racial discrimination and segregation persisted.
Langston Hughes was born on February 1st, 1902 in Joplin, Missouri. He started education at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. He went on to write and publish his first work, a poem called, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” in Crisis magazine. He then continued his education at Columbia University in New York in 1921. He then lived for sometime in Paris and after returning to the United States, he worked in Washington D.C. as a busboy. Later after that, Vachel Lindsay discovered Hughes literary talents. Hughes talents did not only exist in poetry, he also expanded his talent into music, play writing, and short stories, for example the “Simple” stories. His most prominent work however was written and published during the Harlem Renaissance a time where many other African-American authors were showcasing their work and being published. Hughes however, stood above the rest with his multiple talents and work which spread across the board. The white society of America at the time of the Harlem Renaissance and years after began to label him as a radical. Hughes remained extremely prolific to the very end of his life. Hughes published over forty books, including a series of children’s books. However, if you add his translations and his many anthologies of black writing, the amount of books he has published would double. He remained a controversial figure, having been considered a dangerous radical in the 1940s. Hughes was now, as he retained his lifelong commitment to racial integration, rejected by 1960s radicals considered to be a part of the problem, rather than part of the solution. However, that would not stop Hughes from being recognized as one of the important black a...
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Hughes, a.k.a. Langston, a.k.a. “The Negro Speaks of Rivers.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature. Ed.
The contradiction of being both black and American was a great one for Hughes. Although this disparity was troublesome, his situation as such granted him an almost begged status; due to his place as a “black American” poet, his work was all the more accessible. Hughes’ black experience was sensationalized. Using his “black experience” as a façade, however, Hughes was able to obscure his own torments and insecurities regarding his ambiguous sexuality, his parents and their relationship, and his status as a public figure.
Both of Hughes’ paternal great-grandmothers were African American and both of his paternal great-grandfathers were white slave owners of Kentucky. Langston Hughes was the second child of schoolteacher Carrie (Caroline) Mercer Langston and James Nathaniel Hughes. He grew up in a series of Midwestern small towns in Missouri. Hughes's father left his family and later divorced Carrie, going to Cuba, and then Mexico, seeking to escape the enduring racism in the United States (“Biography of Langston Hughes”). His grandmother raised him until he was thirteen (as his father had left him and his mother at a young age) when he moved to Lincoln, Illinois, to live with his mother and her husband. They, later, settled in Cleveland, Ohio. Hughes started writing poetry when he was in Lincoln (“Langston Hughes”).
In the first part of the quote, after five years, the author shows his longing to hear the beautiful sounds of the river and witness the
James Langston Hughes was born February 1, 1902, in Joplin , Missouri . His parents divorced when he was a small child, and his father moved to Mexico . He was raised by his grandmother until he was thirteen, when he moved to Lincoln , Illinois , to live with his mother and her husband, before the family eventually settled in Cleveland , Ohio . It was in Lincoln , Illinois , that Hughes began writing poetry. Following graduation, he spent a year in Mexico and a year at Columbia University . During these years, he held odd jobs as an assistant cook, launderer, and a busboy, and travelled to Africa and Europe working as a seaman. In November 1924, he moved to Washington , D.C. Hughes's first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1926. He finished his college education at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania three years later. In 1930 his first novel, Not Without Laughter, won the Harmon gold medal for literature.
This symbolizes that the Native Americans could no longer get Salmon, which was the center of celebration, because of the construction of the dam. After the construction of the Dam, the tribe was unhappy. This poem made me realize that one should pay equal attention to the positives and negatives. If the government created a solution for the tribe before building the dam, they would not have gone through all the
The poem “Negro” was written by Langston Hughes in 1958, where it was a time of African American development and the birth of the Civil Rights Movement. Langston Hughes, as a first person narrator, tells a story of what he has been through as a Negro, and the life he is proud to have had. He expresses his emotional experiences and makes the reader think about what exactly it was like to live his life during this time. By using specific words, this allows the reader to envision the different situations he has been put through. Starting off the poem with the statement “I am a Negro:” lets people know who he is, Hughes continues by saying, “Black as the night is black, Black like the depths of my Africa.”
Hughes emphasizes his message consistently throughout this poem, weaving in the most important line in the middle and end of the poem. He is representing his people. African Americans have waited and been abused by society, and this deepened and weathered their souls over time, just as a river would become deepened and weathered. Hughes’ soul, the collective soul of African Americans, has become “deep like the rivers” (5). This simile speaks that the rivers are part of the body, and contribute to this immortality that Hughes is so desperate to achieve for his people. Rivers are the earthly symbols of eternity: deep, constant, mystifying.
Hughes poem is about knowing the difference in rivers. His soul is connected to these river because it is the birth of African Americans. There is no rhyme scheme throughout the poem. Ancient:
In “The Negro Speaks of Rivers”, the river stands as a symbol of endlessness, geographical awareness, and the epitome of the human soul. Hughes uses the literary elements of repetition and simile to paint the river as a symbol of timelessness. This is evident in the first two lines of the poem. Hughes introduces this timeless symbol, stating, “I've known rivers: I've known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins” (Hughes 1-2). These opening lines of the poem identifies that the rivers Hughes is speaking about are older than the existence of human life. This indicates the rivers’ qualities of knowledge, permanence, and the ability to endure all. Humans associate “age” with these traits and the longevity of a river makes it a force to be reckoned with. The use of a simile in the line of the poem is to prompt the audience that this is truly a contrast between that ancient wisdom, strength, and determination of the river and the same qualities that characterize a human being. The imagery portrayed in the poem of blood flowing through human veins like a river flows ...
The title of the poem is very significant. The title penetratingly outlines how precious they view the water to be. He does this by titling the poem ''Blessing''. Water is something which most people take for granted, so by making this the title he emphasizes the value they place upon the water. The poet highlights how much value they place upon the water in the fourth stanza when the pipe bursts by using word choice. ''As their blessings sing'' is the quote from the poem and the effect of this is that it gives you a sense of harmony. The words sum up a peaceful ending for the last two stanzas where the mood of the poem changes from desperation to the contrast of greatfulness. The poet has chosen the phrase ''blessings sing'' as when put together it has conitations of bountful amounts of happiness which accuratly shows their joy and relief they would of felt in that moment of time. I think the poet has used this quote to symbolise the end of a struggle which turned into a celebration and the word ''sing'' to create the passion for the villagers in that moment.
The recurring appearance of the river, Alph, is an important reference to the values of Romanticism because it symbolizes the imagination of the speaker. When introducing the river, Coleridge writes, “... Alph, the sacred river, ran / Through caverns measureless to man / Down to a sunless sea” (lines 3-5). In this description of the river, the caverns being “measureless to man” is Coleridge’s way of showing that the Enlightenment belief of using rational thought and reason to discover the unknown is naive because nature, or the speaker’s imagination, is unpredictable. Nature plays a significant role in the poem as if to demonstrate the emphasis on nature that Romantics put into their work. Coleridge focused on nature numerous times in the poem because Romantics felt nature held a deeper, more spiritual meaning within its physical appearance. Coleridge wrote the speaker as both in awe and also wary of the natural world in the second