Langston Hughes´ Memories in His Poems

There are countless times as one grows up when you just stop for a second and reminisce on random things. These memories serve for a very special purpose as the things you do in life shapes you into the person you will become. Today, many authors and poets make use of their memories and experiences in their work as a way to reflect back on their lives, raise awareness, or just simply to tell a story. As a prominent contributor to the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes was an inspirational poet who highlighted many aspects of the urban life of African-Americans through reflections of his own life and experiences.

As a writer, a poet and a prominent activist of the civil rights movement, Langston Hughes was a man that was not only inspired by the world around him but used such inspiration to motivate others. Being that he was also one of the most influential writers during the Harlem Renaissance, Hughes held poetry demonstrations as a way to inspire and strived to be the voice of his people and the force to help the dreams of many to move forward. The idea of whether or not to pursue a dream is addressed in one of his poems where he asks “What happens to a dream deferred?” (Langston Hughes, Dreams Deferred). The style of writing in this poem takes the use of questions as a way to have the reader really ponder about a dream that is not pursued. In a sense, Hughes is trying to paint the picture that the dreams that people do not fight for eventually fade away. He uses this as a tactic to hopefully inspire others that dreams are worth fighting for and without them, what would we live for? The underlying tie that connected all of Hughes’s work together was achieved through his devotion to the realization of a certain dream deferr...

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...ey were facing racial prejudice because whites used to order them around. The end of this poem refers to possible equality between the blacks and the whites and as that equality is in place, the whites would have to realize that the blacks are humans too and they will “be ashamed”. Ashamed could also refer to the African Americans being ashamed of the injustice they have endured. The repetition of the first line of the poem as the last line of the poem with the addition of the word “am”. It shows that it is now the present as “am” in this context is dynamic. This speaks for the oppressed African American race. Through analysis of Langston Hughes’ poetry, one can see how he constantly relates the experiences of himself as well as those of African Americans during this time to highlight points of oppression, inequality, and the loss of dreams (the American Dream).