There is a beautiful marriage between technique and meaning in poetry. If one can fully probe the configuration of poetry; one will see this marriage. Their mind will be seduced by the words, their heart ensnares by its gist, and finally by way of the poem literary devices can be captured involuntarily. A great model of the essence of this relationship is the classic poem “Harlem” by Langston Hughes. In this poem, the author approaches the universal despair of dreams being deferred and underlines the fallouts of it. His precise techniques that influence this poem help it emerge into a metaphorical warning statement about dreams becoming disregarded in life. The author’s specific uses of similes and metaphors allows for interpretation by his readers regarding the main idea behind his poem, and in this essay I will examine how these literary techniques help to ameliorate the author’s meaning. The use of similes in “Harlem” creates a serious mood and emphasizes the theme. In the beginning of the poem the author asks a question about what will happen to a dream when deferred. The simile...
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...
Both poems address the fundamental theme of having a dream. This is the ever-occurring dream that is explored during the Harlem renaissance period; the dream of justice that is deferred. However, even in having the same theme, it is explored and is envisioned by the poets in different ways. In “A Dream Deferred”, Hughes describes the negative potentials of a dream that is delayed, warning that this may be dangerous. For example, he describes how ‘[it may] fester like a sore and then run’ which shows that if this dream remains unfulfilled, it will get ‘infected’ and lead to a greater, more destructive problem (4-5). Also, the dream may ‘crust and sugar over, like a syrupy sweet’, which describes how if a dream is forced to sit idle, it will lose its original goal, and harden into destructive thoughts that are crusted over with doubt, anger and hatred. It is even brought to a greater extreme; where Hughes describes how this dream may simply ‘explode’ (11). This shows the catastrophe that may result from the impatience of African-Americans who really want to achieve this dream of justice. On the other hand, in “My Little ...
When needing to seek refuge, Annie Dillard goes to Tinker Creek and immerses herself in nature. During one of these trips, she has a little snippet of a revelation, which makes her see the beauty and the ugliness of the world in harmony and thus a sense of what the world is. In this passage, Dillard uses symbolism, verb choice and similes to explain how even though something might be ugly and appalling, it is part of the beauty of life.
The speaker in “Harlem” is an African-American activist in Harlem who is fighting for rights of the African-Americans who live in Harlem. Although written by the same author, “Harlem” and “Harlem Night Song” have similarities and differences in literary devices, tone and mood. In “Harlem Night Song”, Hughes used non-consistent rhyme. In the poem, it states, “The Harlem roof-tops/Moon is shining./Night sky is blue./Stars are great drops/Of
“Harlem” by Langston Hughes is a poem that talks about what happens when we postpones our dreams. The poem is made up of a series of similes and it ends with a metaphor. The objective of the poem is to get us to think about what happens to a dream that is put off, postponed; what happens when we create our very own shelve of dreams? The “dream” refers to a goal in life, not the dreams we have while sleeping, but our deepest desires. There are many ways to understand this poem; it varies from person to person. Some may see this poem as talking about just dreams in general. Others may see it as African-American’s dreams.
Sonnets is a type of poetry that originated in Italy. There are many different types of sonnets, such as the Shakespearean sonnet, Petrarchan sonnet, and the Spenserian sonnet. Despite their differences, these sonnets share some similarities. “Harlem Dancer” by Claude McKay and “In an Artist’s Studio” by Christina Rossetti share many similarities and differences such as the form, the portrayal of women, and the way the woman is objectified.
In Langston Hughes’ poem, the author gives us vivid examples of how dreams get lost in the weariness of everyday life. The author uses words like dry, fester, rot, and stink, to give us a picture of how something that was originally intended for good, could end up in defeat. Throughout the play, I was able to feel how each character seemed to have their dreams that fell apart as the story went on. I believe the central theme of the play has everything to do with the pain each character goes thru after losing control of the plans they had in mind. I will attempt to break down each character’s dream and how they each fell apart as the play went on.
...ss, representing the truth of the times. The majority of the problems influence only the one dreamer, however, the ending suggests that, when despair is everywhere, it may "explode" and cause social and political uprising. “Harlem” brings to light the anxiety between the need for Negro expression and the opposition to that need because of society’s subjugation of its black populace. His lines confront the racist and unjust attitude common in American society before the civil rights movement of the 1960s. it expresses the belief that black wishes and dreams were irrelevant should be ignored. His closing rhetorical question—“Or does [a dream deferred] explode?”—is aggressive, a testimony that the inhibition of black dreams might result in a revolution. It places the blame for this possible revolution on the domineering society that forces the deferment of the dream.
1. After my close reading of "Story in Harlem Slang", it can be said that the Harlem Slang is unique to people from Harlem and if you are not from Harlem or an Harlemese, you might not understand the message they are trying to convey. The author, Zora Neale shows us how this slang is unique through Jelly and Sweet back's character. Both characters communicate using their Harlem Slangs and spent a lot of time trying to seem bigger than they are to one another through lying about the women they’ve been with and the money they have received from them. Jelly decodes his words by using words and terms whereby Sweetback would grab quickly, he said "Naw-naw-naw-now Sweet Back, long as you been knowing me, you ain't never seen me with nothing but
Hughes, Langston. "Harlem (A Dream Deferred)." Literature and the Writing Process. Elizabeth McMahan, Susan X. Day, and Robert Funk. 6th ed. Upper Saddle River. Prentice, 2002. 534.
An adequate, detailed description of the setting in ay novel is essential to the reader’s experience. The reader is not provided with any visual cues (unless it is a rare case and the book is illustrated) and must rely solely on the author’s writing ability to achieve a sense of full emersion into the storyline. When the reader is provided with vague detail it is easy for the individual to become frustrated and quickly lose interest. In Chester Himes novel “A Rage in Harlem”, Himes does an excellent job of putting the reader directly in the center of twentieth century Harlem. At times his descriptive writing style border on the extreme, perhaps even making the reader in an emotionally uncomfortable situation. However, with his unique writing style was able to bring the city of Harlem to life for many individuals, who if not to Himes, would have never been exposed to the reality of Harlem and individuals who “lived” Harlem every single day of their lives.
In the poem Langston Hughes uses a range of illusions, rhetorical questions, figurative language and
Symbolism embodies Hughes’ literary poem through his use of the river as a timeless symbol. A river can be portrayed by many as an everlasting symbol of perpetual and continual change and of the constancy of time and of life itself. People have equated rivers to the aspects of life - time, love, death, and every other indescribable quality which evokes human life. This analogy is because a river exemplifies characteristics that can be ultimately damaging or explicitly peaceable. In the poem, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” Langston Hughes cites all of these qualities.
Gwendolyn Brook’s “Ballad of Pearl May Lee” came from her book called Street in Bronzeville. This book exemplifies Brook’s “dual place in American literature” (Smith, 2). It is associated with Modernist poetry, as well as the Harlem Renaissance. This book is known for its theme of victimizing the poor, black woman. “Ballad of Pearl May Lee” is a poem that uses tone to represent the complex mood of the ballad. While tone and mood are often used interchangeably, there are differences even though they often work together in a poem. A poem’s mood refers to the atmosphere or state of mind that the poem takes on. This is often conveyed through the tone, which is the style or manner of expression through writing. In this poem, Brooks uses tone to enhance the mood. This paper will shed light on the idea that the mood of the poem is affected by the tone in several ways in order to make the mood inconsistent. Some of the ways that tone does this is by several episodic shifts in the scene of the poem, the repetition of stanzas at the end of the poem, the use of diction, and the change in the speaker’s stance throughout the poem. These poetic techniques enhance the speaker’s current feeling of self-pity and revengeful satisfaction by her mixed emotions associated with this reflection.
middle of paper ... ... Edward J. Mullen notes that Hughes' poem represents the idea that, "the inhabitants of this 1951 Harlem seem to be seeking feverishly and forlornly for some simple yet apparently unattainable satisfaction in life" (142). Both Hansberry's play and Hughes' poem establish a powerful and human reaction to the death of a dream.