Essay on Langston Hughes: American Poet and Social Activist

The well known poet Langston Hughes was an inspiring character during the Harlem Renaissance to provide a push for the black communities to fight for the rights they deserved. Hughes wrote his poetry to deliver important messages and provide support to the movements. When he was at a young age a teacher introduced him to poets Carl Sandburg and Walt Whitman, and they inspired him to start his own. Being a “darker brother,” as he called blacks, he experienced and wanted his rights, and that inspired him. Although literary critics felt that Langston Hughes portrayed an unattractive view of black life, the poems demonstrate reality. Hughes used the Blues and Jazz to add effect to his work as well as his extravagant word use and literary

Langston Hughes was one of the great writers of his time. He was named the “most renowned African American poet of the 20th century” (McLaren). Through his writing he made many contributions to following generations by writing about African American issues in creative ways including the use of blues and jazz. Langston Hughes captured the scene of Harlem life in the early 20th century significantly influencing American Literature. He once explained that his writing was an attempt to “explain and illuminate the Negro condition in America” (Daniel 760). To fulfill this task, he wrote 15 volumes of poetry, six novels, three books, 11 plays, and a variety of non-fiction work (Daniel 760). He also edited over 50 books in his time (McKay).

(Hughes's grandfather) was a fierce abolitionist. She helped Hughes to see the cause of social

Langston Hughes was someone who never gave up on his dream. He was an African-American born in Missouri in 1902. He received his education at Columbia University and later went on to go to Lincoln University. Although he is most well known for being a poet, he held a variety of other jobs ranging from a busboy to a columnist in his early years. In the 1920s America entered the Harlem Renaissance, a time of appreciation for black heritage. It was at this point in history that he became an important writer. The reason he was so important to this time in history is because his writing, “offers a transcription of urban life through a portrayals of the speech habits attitudes and feelings of an oppressed people. The poems do more, however, than

     People always listen to music, watch movies or plays, and even read poetry without once even thinking what is could be that helps and artist eventually create a masterpiece. Often times, it is assumed that artists just have a “gift”, and people just do not consider the circumstances and situations that gradually mold a dormant idea into a polished reality. This seems to be the case with nearly every famous actor, writer, painter, or musician; including the ever-famous Langston Hughes.

Foremost, Langston Hughes was born on February 1st, 1902 in Joplin, Missouri to two black parents. They later divorced which caused Hughes to move around a lot and be raised by his grandmother. Through his friends and schoolmates, Hughes was “introduced to leftist literature and ideology” (Gale Group), as they associated with socialism. This marked the beginning of Hughes avid love of reading and literature. He was influenced by The Souls of Black Folk which which was a classic novel about racism that inspired his writing and poems about the “experiences, attitudes, and language of everyday black Americans” (Gale Group). Hughes experienced racism first hand through his father, as he considered all other races inferior to whites, further alienating Hughes from him. At 17, he wrote “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” which celebrated the voice and soul of the black community in a time of great hatred, helping to unite and inspire blacks during the Harlem Renaissance. The Harlem Renaissance was a time of cultural rebirth and a movement during the 1920s and 1930s in America in which black artists, activists, musicians, and writers “found new ways to explore and celebrate the black experience” (Gale Group) in the midst of white oppression. Hughes’ poetry gave a voice and inspiration for many black people across America as he detailed their struggles and pain related to the racial prejudice shown against them. The way Hughes wrote, threading in “structures and rhythms of jazz music” (Gale Group), his

Langston Hughes is regarded as one of the most significant American authors of the twentieth century. Foremost a poet, he was the first African-American to earn a living solely from his writings after he became established. Over a forty-year career beginning in the 1920s until his death in 1967, Hughes produced poetry, plays, novels, and a variety of nonfiction. He is perhaps best known for his creation of the fictional character, Jesse B. Semple, which first appeared in a Chicago Defender newspaper column in 1943. Hughes’ writings focused mainly on the lives of plain black people and show their beauty, wisdom, and strength to overcome social and economic injustice.

He explains, “I was only an American Negro—who had loved the surface of Africa—but I was not Africa. I was Chicago and Kansas City and Broadway and Harlem. I was not what she wanted me to be” (Hughes as quoted in Cobb 44). Hughes wants to make sure people are aware that the life and culture of African Americans differ drastically from the romantic view of the Negro in Africa. In his poem “Mother to Son,” Hughes provides the story of struggle, poverty overcame by hard work, and hope for a more dignified life for the entire African American people (Niemi 1). Hughes recognizes that despite being oppressed, the black community is strong enough to empower itself with determination to succeed. When discussing working-class life, Hughes consistently “asserts blacks as fully complex, fully human, and equals in the American democratic experiment” and does not play into the thought that blacks should be kept down (Sanders 107). Langston Hughes’ “concern for the lives and oppression of poor and working-class blacks” is apparent in most of his work (Sanders 107). Through his writing he makes the population aware of the deep-set oppression put upon the black community.

Both of these people have inspired many people in the world including me. Langston Hughes

James Langston Hughes was known as the most creative African American writer of the 1920s to the 1960s. His sense of racial pride and love for activism allowed him to be so successful in writing 16 collections of poetry, two novels seven collections of short stories, two autobiographies, five non fiction texts, and nine books for children. Hughes was born on February 1, 1902 in Joplin, Missouri. Hughes grew up amid one of the harshest times in American History; when African Americans didn't have the privileges of freedom of speech, or the right to vote. Hughes grew up living with his grandmother because when he was only 5 years old, his father abandoned him and his mother. During his youth, Hughes constantly traveled extensively due to the separation of his parents, and the desperate need of his mother to find income

James Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Mississippi and eventually moves to Lawrence, Kansas to be with his grandmother, Mary Langston his father lived in Cuba, and was not present often throughout the early years of his life. Hughes spent the most time with his granmother, while his mother worked (Tracy). By the time Hughes’ reached the eighth grade, he developed an aptitude for poetry, and was elected the class poet. His father was not very supportive of his artistic dreams, and ecouraged him to enter a more pratical career. He enrolled his son into classes at Columbia with a major in engineering. Due to his lack of passion for engineering, Hughes eventually dropped out of Columbia, with a B+ average. His first of many famous poems, “The

     Langston Hughes’s writing showcases a variety of themes and moods, and his distinguished career led his biographer, Arnold Rampersad, to describe him as “perhaps the most representative black American writer.” Many of his poems illustrate his role as a spokesman for African American society and the working poor. In others, he relates his ideas on the importance of heritage and the past. Hughes accomplishes this with a straightforward, easily understandable writing style that clearly conveys his thoughts and opinions, although he has frequently been criticized for the slightly negative tone to his works.

Langston Hughes’s life contained key influences on his work. As a child, Hughes witnessed a divorce between his parents and the subsequent death of his grandmother, his primary caretaker at the time. Hughes’s childhood was also marked by the constant transition of moving from city to

Langston Hughes was born on February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri, as James mercer Langston Hughes. During his life Hughes was separated soon after his birth and was raise by his grandmother until her death in his early teens. Langston Hughes was one of the primary dark men to express the soul of blues and jazz into words. An African American Hughes turned into an outstanding writer,