On The Road By Langston Hughes

The unidentified mother in the poem may be suggestive of the African American women motivating their sons to fight for prosperity. This poem is compose in the shape of a considerable monologue in black dialect.  The idiomatic style of the tongue is cited in the context of the bravery, tolerance and sense of duty of the African American race. The tongue also gives a charged conversational component to the poem. The subject of the poem is persistence and determination.

“Merry-Go-Round” is a poem about a little colored child that goes to the carnival. The child wants to ride the merry-go-round, but has a problem finding the back. From where the child comes from, Jim Crow laws segregate the blacks from the whites. This poem has a lot of depth and meaning, although it sounds very simple. It also tells us the mindset of most blacks in the South in the days of segregation. I chose this poem because the boy’s innocence was touching and its deep meaning was very powerful.

Has America ever been great, of the 239 years this influential country has been a country has it ever been truly great and free? As Langston Hughes exclaimed, "America never was America to me”. Learned Hand and Langston Hughes had differences on their thought on the topic of Liberty and whether America is great. Hughes and Hands opinion of Liberty has changed the way the common man reacts to racism and the way we perceive America's greatness.

The two poems “White Lies” by Natasha Trethewey and “Theme for English B” by Langston Hughes were written to express racial dilemmas that the authors went through. Thematically, they represent the American Dream. In “White Lies” we see that Trethewey went through some racial identity issues. She felt as if she had to lie to blend in with the rest of the whites, which was easy for her because she was mixed. To understand the full meaning of this poem, one assumes that Trethewey was the product of an interracial marriage. This type of thing was frowned upon during the time she grew up. In the poem “Theme for English B” Hughes seems to accept the fact that he is different. Hughes does not seem to have a problem with expressing his difference. He looks at as his individuality and strives to let everyone know that he is proud of who he is. The two poems have many similarities and differences.

Throughout Langston Hughes' novel, Not Without Laughter, the author introduces multiple characters that reveal their notions of prejudice. The novel explores that prejudice in one form or another is in every aspect of one's life. Prejudice can be defined as an opinion for or against a person's look, race, class, or religion, which is usually formed by a hasty generalization. Most of the main characters, Aunt Hager, Sister Johnson, Jimboy, Harriet, and Tempy contain different accounts of prejudice in the world, which stimulate many of Sandy's thoughts of life as he comes of age. Aunt Hager, Annjee, Harriet, and Sandy, are a multi-generation poor African American family that live in a small home together but are eventually divided by multiple circumstances. The story takes place during the 1910s in the small town of Stanton, Kansas.

The Jim Crow South was a carefully designed ecosystem of racial discrimination, maintained by prejudice within the legal and extra-legal facets of life. In Chapter Five of Trouble In The Mind by Leon F. Litwack, he deconstructs the racial discrimination that consumed the “Southern way of life”, essentially breaking it down into four major characteristics: disenfranchisement, segregation, manipulation of the judicial system, and violence. (218-219) Each characteristic targets a particular aspect of black life and when combined together, make for the immeasurable hardship that embodied black life during the late 1800s, through the early 20th century, and well into the 50’s, with clear

Due to discrimination, most blacks lived in poverty. “According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 55 percent of blacks lived under the poverty line in 1959” (“Minority Rights”). Discrimination in this time period led to many drawbacks—one of the lesser not being the fact that over half of the African American population in the United States sat beneath the poverty line. Secondly, this was merely a general fact, a general fact that was quite overlooked and seen as quite contrary to the abnormal. “For blacks in the rural South, poverty and the attendant deprivation, along with racial discrimination, were the depressing norm” (“Poverty” 76). Overall, discrimination from the 1930s to the late 50s-60s had improved, but not by much, as poverty among the black populous was normal and existed only because of the heartless discrimination that persevered even after all those

Lorraine Hansberry, the author of Raisin in the Sun, simulates the title of her play from the famous line in the poem “Harlem” by Langston Hughes, in which the poet asks, “What happens to a dream deferred?” A dream deferred is a vision that someone has, but due to certain circumstances, their fantasy life is either ignored or put on hold. For the Younger family, their dream of living as an ordinary middle-class black family and being accepted by the whites was deferred at one point. At the time the story took place, the blacks in the Chicago area still faced racism just like the south. The dream of the Younger family was very essential to each of them. They were willing to do literally anything to make their dreams come true.

“Let America Be America Again” focuses on the idea of the American dream and how for many wanting freedom, equality and happiness which the dream itself to begin impossible to attain

Langston Hughes has a type of cynical view on America that seems to change its taste as he gets older. The first to look at is “I,Too” where he seems to have a hopeful view of his country and separates the citizens from the country. He says things such as “They’ll see how beautiful I am” which shows that he feels good about his future and the future of racial tension. Which he then transitions into “Let America be America again” where he is crtizieing the American people for saying that they are about liberty and freedom when they are his oppressors. It’s more of a call to action than his last few poems he is more so pointing out the injustices than just stating that there are some. And by the tone of the poem you can tell that he has lost

Nothing is more fascinating nor more compelling than the study of our own human condition. Often the most enthralling and alluring way of expressing the human condition can be found within the very literature we read, in particular, poetry. Poems are an expression of art; a way to simultaneously condense emotions in the pursuit of an ideal. One ideal of particular note is inspiration. So let me ask you this: if we live in a world where inspiration is so easy to come by through poetry, why is our world plagued with inequality and injustice? Why is it the case that race relations, racism and bigotry are never far from the surface? That, ladies and gentlemen, is my question to you. I’m your host James Pullen – welcome to Peace and Poetry.

The Harlem Renaissance was a time period when African American culture came to fruition. Many musicians, artists, and literary authors published their work, and are still read to this day. Some of these works include Langston Hughes’ “Dreams” and Zora Neale Hurston’s “How It Feels To Be Colored Me”. While both these authors faced some of the same problems, they have different attitudes and outlooks toward life.

In the poem “50-50” by Langston Hughes, the theme is about a lonely woman seeking love. She might be a young woman who left her family in the South and moved North during the Great Migration for better opportunities, and that might be the reason why she feels she is all alone in this world. Or, she might be a widow or someone who has lost a partner, or boyfriend. She feels she is all alone because she has no man in her life.

“What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?” This poem, Harlem, created a whole play based on one line (Hughes, 1055-1056). Langston Hughes wrote the poem Harlem due to his major role in the Harlem Renaissance. A Raisin in the Sun was concocted by Hughes one line, this play tells the story of an African American family living in the slums during a time when racial dilemmas were at an all time high. The family receives money from Mama’s husband passing away, but the family has disputes on how the money should be spent (Hansberry, 443-512). Throughout the play the title has significance by Hughes poem Harlem, African American lives in the 1950s, and the different dreams of the family members.

This quote is from Langston Hughes poem “I, Too,” and this quote is discussing slavery and how during those times, the slaves had to stay out of the way when company would come over. This poem deals with racial segregation because slaves and African Americans were to be separated from white people. This poem also deals with oppression because African Americans were often treated unfairly. I believe that the overall theme of this poem is freedom because as we continue to read the poem the narrator states,This shows the reader that the narrator is going to refuse to be sent to another room when company comes because he says, (Hughes 872) which shows the audience that he would like to be treated like an American and would like to be treated