A Comparison Of Dreams And Harlem By Langston Hughes

Langston Hughes’ poetry frequently cites the “American Dream” from the perspective of those who were disenfranchised in American, such as the Native Americans, African Americans, poor farmers, and oppressed immigrants. The American Dream was defined by James Truslow Adams as, “life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement” (Langston Hughes). Hughes’ poetry portrays the glories of equality, liberty, and the “American Dream” as the disenfranchised were trapped beneath oppression, poverty, and prejudice. Whose dreams are smothered and buried in a life characterized by the anguish of survival.

The use of figurative language definitely adds to the poet's message, in a big way. Hughes asks "What happens to a dream deferred" and in that line he uses alliteration. He doesn't say what the dream was, but the reader knows he is alluding to the dreams of Black Americans because the title "Harlem" represents a community in New York City that is heavily populated with Black folks.

One of Hughes most famous poems, “Harlem(Dream Deferred)” had a great impact by posing lots of questioning. According to critic Tom Hanson, this poem is just that simple because it gives a bunch of undesirable answers to the same question, “What happens to a dream deferred?” Hanson also says how this poem refers almost completely to an unsolved problem (Hanson, Harlem). The poem gives four rather unpleasant interrogatives and one declarative answer followed by the sixth possibility, “Or does it explode?” which is supposed to be a question to make a reader really think. There are several ways to interpret the meaning of the final line, and the most sensible explanation is, the African American community is “deferring dreams” and in doing so their dreams explode in terms of the chance to act is gone. Some may say Hughes presented an unattractive view

Langston Hughes was a successful African-American poet of the Harlem renaissance in the 20th century. Hughes' had a simple and cultured writing style. "Harlem" is filled with rhythm, jazz, blues, imagery, and evokes vivid images within the mind. The poem focuses on what could happen to deferred dreams. Hughes' aim is to make it clear that if you postpone your dreams you might not get another chance to attain it--so take those dreams and run. Each question associates with negative effects of deferred dreams. The imagery from the poem causes the reader to be pulled in by the writer's words.

Two poems are not as widely anthologized, but are thematically comparable in the manner Hughes expresses the disparity among the American Dream and the fact of life for African people in the course of the early twentieth Century.

taste, hear and touch. ' Does it dry up Like a raisin in the sun' this

Influence of Poet’s Perspective on Harlem Depending on one’s perspective of Harlem, a neighborhood of New York’s Manhattan which has shaped the lives of many African American immigrants, it could be viewed as either a utopia or dystopia. There are many poems written about Harlem and they all add to our understanding of Harlem through the poet’s point of view of the neighborhood. Each poet’s distinctive perspectives influence the reader’s understanding of Harlem by allowing us to see the neighborhood at a different aspect. Langston Hughes described Harlem as a cold, heartless place where dreams perish.

In our journey through life, we all have certain expectations of how we would like our lives to be. All of us strive to reach a certain level of self-actulization and acceptance. It could thus be said that all of us live a dream. Some of these individual dreams inevitably become the collective dream of many people. In "Harlem (A Dream Deferred)", Langston Hughes makes use of symbolism as well as powerful sensory imagery to show us the emotions that he and his people go through in their quest for freedom and equality. By using questions he builds the poem towards an exciting climax.

Langston Hughes was one of the most important writers and thinkers of the Harlem Renaissance. One of his most prominent work was a poem was a poem called Harlem. The speaker starts off in this poem by asking what happens to a dream deferred and tries to come up with possible answers. He wonders if dreams dried up like a raisin in the sun, ooze like a wound and then run, smell like rotten mean or develop a sugary crust. Hughes wrote this poem to address the limitations of the American Dream for African Americans. During the 1950s, when this poem was written in, America was racially segregate and African Americans had a legacy of slavery on their backs that rendered them a lower class. Hughes wrote this poem three years before the case Brown vs. Board of Education that declared states to establish separate public schools for

When reading poetry, it can often be difficult to interpret the exact meaning of the poem the author was trying to transmit. A reader must learn to construe a poem without getting confused on what the author was trying to convey. We must scrutinize the work so that we may understand it better. In Langston Hughes “Harlem,” to analyze what this poem is trying to interpret we must understand line for line. The poem has eleven lines and all but one is asking a question. In each line except line seven, the last syllable stressed. Six of the seven sentences in the poem are questions. All of the sentences except the first and the last contain similes using like. Line three rhymes with line five; line six rhymes with line eight; line ten rhymes with line eleven. Lines four, seven, and eleven begin with or. Lines three, eight, and ten begin with like. The narrator is asking these questions to have the reader envision the lurid analogies to evoke the illusion of a postponed dream. One must also uncover the hidden meanings that stated in this poem. Written in 1951, Harlem addresses one of the most common themes of the time, inadequacies of the American Dreams of African Americans.

Langston Hughes’s “Harlem” questions what would happen if one doesn’t fulfill one’s dreams. Hughes is an African American who wrote this poem in 1951. During this time, the African Americans didn’t have many rights so “Harlem” could have been written to show the experiences and thoughts that the African Americans had at the time. Hughes uses similes to appeal to the senses of taste, smell, and touch which creates a vivid image of what deferred dreams would “look” or be like.

By beginning the poem with a question, Hughes is able to create a feeling of suspense that he otherwise could not without a question. This is because the reader is left wondering what does happen when a dream is deferred. And by dream, he means the dream for African American equality that is unanswered by white oppressors.

In the poem “Harlem”, Langston Hughes uses literary devices to portray the African-American community as oppressed, however, strong-willed people, with the intention to warn those in power of a revolution. First of all, the African-American community is depicted to be oppressed as Hughes uses similes throughout the poem. Namely, when their dreams are compared to something “sag[ging] like a heavy load”; the line represents how an unpursued desire can emotionally feel like it is weighing you down. Especially when it is against one’s power whether or not they may follow their own ambitions due to racial injustice. On the other hand, Langston uses a metaphor to illustrate how the people of colour may also be strong-willed. The poem ends by asking

Hughes placed a particular emphasis on Harlem, an area in New York that was predominately Black, which became a Mecca for many hopeful blacks in the first half of the 1900's. Hughes has a theme in most of his poetry, in other words his writing style was to write poetry that is called "dream deferred". His use of a "dream deferred" focus in several poems paints a vivid picture of the disappointment and dismay that blacks in America faced in Harlem. Furthermore, as each his poems develop, so does the feeling behind a "dream deferred," his words make the reader feel the growing anger and seriousness even more at each new stanza.

Dreams are hopes that people hope to accomplish in their lifetime. When trying to achieve these goals, people are willing to do anything. But, what happens when a dream is deferred? A dream pushed aside can disappoint a person in the deepest way. It is likely to spread throughout their thoughts and becomes a burden. In the poem “Harlem,” Langston Hughes, through literary devices, introduce a strong theme through a short amount of language Hughes is asking what happens to a dream that is being put off.