Comparing Of Mice And Men And I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, and Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” express the hardships people and creatures are faced with, preventing them from succeeding. Angelou discusses an earnest comparison between a free bird and its counterpart, a “caged” bird and its desire to prosper freely. Both texts express how those who are exposed to restrictions yearn for the comfort of liberty. In addition, Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men depicts the universal lesson of characters possessing relentless ambitions while remaining constricted to a life of hardship. George and Lennie share a common objective, living freely on their own land, being their own bosses, and tending woodland animals. During desperate times on the ranch, when men would begin to doubt their possibilities, Lennie would incessantly

Angelou identifies the bars of the “cage” as racism, sexism, and the powerlessness of their victims, whose disabling responses of “fear, guilt, and self-revulsion” merely become additional restraints. The poem uses singing as a form of attempted liberty and self-expression, that the bird endeavors to discover. In the second stanza, its states, “his wings are clipped and/ his feet are tired/ so he opens his throat to sing.” As the bird is restrained physically, his only attempt at acquiring freedom is with the assistance of singing. Angelou proposes the bird’s deepest yearning is to exist outside of the repressive cage, so it acts as though it were free by singing confidently. The third stanza states, “his tune is heard/ on the distant hill/ for the caged bird/ sings of freedom.” The bird displays his prominent ambitions in a manner that leaves readers acknowledging its main objective: freedom to soar the sky as it pleases to. Although the birds high-pitched notes appear fearful, it longs for liberty in a savage like