Thematic Analysis Of Mother To Son By Langston Hughes

In the poem, “Mother to Son” harlem renaissance Langston Hughes writes of a mother’s heartbreaking journey through a never ending cycle of life through the use of figurative language and complex structure. The reader is able to fully receive the message the author has provided.

Reporter: Hi Mr Hughes, so I’ve learnt that recently one of your poems , “Mother To Son is published”. Congratulations, but besides from the blissful joy of happiness, can you share with us your feelings right now? Are we happy? Proud?

Langston Hughes’ poem “Mother to Son,” written in 1922, tells the story of a young mother giving important life lessons to her son. It conveys the struggles and hardships that the mother was forced to endure throughout her life, while portraying her as a woman who never gave up hope and got through the hard times. The strength and resilience she shows is a testament to the power of a mother’s love and willingness to do anything for their family. Hughes is able to portray this love and emotion with the use of various literary elements, such as rhymes and metaphors.

In the poem “Mother to Son”, Langston Hughes uses the deep connection between a mother and her son and descriptive rhetoric to bring hope and inspire the African American people to fight for their rights.The author most likely wrote the poem for the African American audience because it is written in an African American slang during the Harlem Renaissance. However, any minority group can relate to this creation because it is about people who are going through a difficult time. Hughes describes the arduous reality of life; one in which people have to overcome challenges and face their worst fears in order to reach the top of the ladder. He is telling the African American people that they cannot give up during the hard times. Moreover, the author utilized the deep connection between a mother and her son to make the poem more dramatic. Since mothers are known to have a soft and caring voice towards their children. They traditionally will do anything for their kids. This drama appeals to the readers and gives them hope for the future. The future consists of fulfilling their American dream. The American cream stands for the idea that every person should have an equal opportunity to achieve prosperity and success through hard work and determination. Next, Langston Hughes hoped to encourage the African American people to fight for their rights. To drive his point home, the author described his journey through time in painstaking detail, which helps the readers connect to the

Adversity is a central component of every individual's life. It is the difficult situations that shape our identity and help us recognize who we are. Difficult situations have the ability to transform our perceptions and values of the world while morphing us into stronger and more confident individuals. However, it is when refuse to cope with our struggles ourselves and push the responsibility of solving our problems over to others that problems arise. When faced with adversity it is common for individuals to turn to their parents not hoping for, but expecting assistance. They do not face their own struggles and expect their parents to assist them in doing so. In the short story "Mother to Son" the author, Langston Hughes demonstrates the importance of individuals overcoming obstacles with little intervention from their parents in order for it to benefit them.

"Life is a system of half-truths and lies, Opportunistic, convenient evasion( Langston Hughes)." In Langston Hughes' poem "Mother to Son" an ever enduring mother shares her gritty truths and revelations with her discouraged son. She uses the comparison of life to a dilapidated stair case to display hidden inconsistencies of equality and fairness. Poet Langston Hughes uses a concoction of diction, figurative language, hyperbole and symbolism to clearly express the every day realities in the lives of

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.

The poet Langston Hughes was born in 1902 in Joplin, missouri to an African American family. Hughes later on, attending central high school in Cleveland, Ohio where he would excel in both academics and sports, however Hughes also wrote poetry and short fiction for the high school literary magazine he would also edit the yearbook. In 1921, he went on to Columbia university for a year before dropping out for a time he worked as a cabin boy on a merchant ship, visited Africa, and wrote poems for a number of American magazines. Mother to son was first published in the magazine crisis in December of 1922. The author Langston Hughes, who came from a struggling African American family was often criticized that he would never make it as a poet. The poem mother to son mostly relates to him and his family's

Many Americans did not know how and African American’s daily life went. Through Hughes’ writing he portrayed their lives to help show their desire and need for civil rights. In his poem, “Mother to Son”, a mother is talking to her son about how life is much harder for them, but that he must never give up, “Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair...Don’t you fall now- For I’se still goin’, honey, I’se still climbin’, And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair”(Lines 1, 17-20). Hughes has assumed the role of speaking for the black community and the way that they live. Rita Dove and Marilyn Nelson write in their work, “Langston Hughes and Harlem”, how Hughes gives other Americans a glimpse of their lives, “His work offers white readers a glimpse into the social and the personal lives of Black America;”(1152). Hughes uses the simple conversation between a mother and son to show the American people how much different and harder their lives

Langston Hughes, the poet of “Mother to Son”, incorporates the theme, even though life will be filled with hardships and complications, it is best to keep going and remain positive for the future. He presents his audience with the comparison of a mother’s life and a staircase in order to inform readers that life is not pristine. The mother first commences the line, “Well, son, I’ll tell you: / Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair” (1-2). All of the things that happened to her caused her life to consist of numerous difficulties. With the use of the line, “But all the time / I’se been a climbin on” (7-8), the mother indicates that she keeps moving on, and is able to conquer the difficulties that come toward her. She has yet to accomplish any

How do you encourage your child? The mother in the poem Mother to Son by Langston Hughes uses a couple of literary devices to encourage her son. Three of said devices used are tone, metaphor, and repetition. The overall tone of this poem is encouragement. This mother has apparently had a difficult life filled with many challenges.

The poem “Mother to Son” by Langston Hughes is the story of a mother speaking of life’s hardships to her son. The poem starts off with the protagonist’s haunting words about the difficulty of life; however, as the story goes on, her words of despair become words of wisdom to her son on never giving up. Hughes organizes this poem by transitioning the tone from hopelessness to encouragement to convey the raw message that although life can be hard, anyone can reach their goals with effort.

“F-E-A-R has two meanings: ‘Forget Everything And Run’ or ‘Face Everything And Rise.’ The choice is yours.” -Zig Ziglar. How do we as humans face the emotion we call fear? Do we let it’s terrifying surface consume us and hold us back from partaking in something we wish to do, or do we let it fuel us, empower us, into doing something that we never thought we could? Do you hold yourself back and hide from that fear and hope it goes away just like the monsters under your bed, or do you take control, and fight? Maya Angelou talks about locking yourself up in a cage full of your fears and doubts and trying to escape and become free of your struggles. In Langston Hughes poem, “Mother to Son,” Hughes talks about how a son is struggling to go through life and he wants to give up because of his fears and doubts, but his mother is trying to persuade him into sticking with it and continue living life. Finally, Robert Frost discusses how your fears shouldn’t hold you back from continuing life and choosing a path to go on. Everyone has to face their fears at some point, it just depends on the person if they choose to fight it or not. Whether you're grabbing the bull by the horns, or you’re closing the gate. You’re looking your fear right in the face.

According to Biography, James Mercer Langston Hughes is considered to be an African American poet who is college educated and comes from a middle-class family (Langston Hughes Biography). He attended college in New York City and became influential during the Harlem Renaissance (Langston Hughes Biography). Although Hughes was a talented writer, he faced some challenges early on and it was stated that his “early work was roundly criticized by many black intellectuals for portraying what they thought to be an unattractive view of black life” (Langston Hughes. American Poet). They believed that his work helps the spread the stereotypes of African Americans. “Hughes, more than any other black poet or writer, recorded faithfully the nuances of black life and its frustrations” (Langston Hughes. American Poet). Langston Hughes’s poems “The Negro Mother”, “Let America be America Again” and “The Weary Blues” were influenced by his life during the Harlem Renaissance and the racial inequality experienced in the late 1920s through the 1960s.

“Mother to Son” by Langston Hughes has the narrator as the mother who describes her challenges in her life using symbols like; tacks, splinters, uncarpeted floor and dark, unlit corners. The mother is wanting her son to not go back down the stairs. Life gets tough, but don’t lose faith, eventually you will get through your struggles. As a mother myself, I understood where she was coming on how life can give you lots of bumps, but to keep putting one foot in front of the other. She demonstrates the love between a mother and a son. The poem opens up with the comparison of the mothers struggles and a not perfect staircase.