When reading the literature of Langston Hughes, I cant help but feeling energetically charged and inspired. Equality, freedom, empowerment, renaissance, justice and perseverance, are just a taste of the subject matter Hughes offers. He amplifies his voice and beliefs through his works which are firmly rooted in race pride and race feeling. Hughes committed himself both to writing and to writing mainly about African Americans. His early love for the “wonderful world of books” was sparked by loneliness and parental neglect. He would soon lose himself in the works of Walt Whitman, Paul Laurence, Carl Sandburg and other literary greats which would lead to enhancing his ever so growing style and grace of oeuvre. Such talent, character, and willpower could only come from one’s life experiences. Hughes had allot to owe to influences such as his grandmother and great uncle John Mercer Langston - a famous African American abolitionist. These influential individuals helped mold Hughes, and their affect shines brightly through his literary works of art.
One of the most important of the influential people in Langston Hughes’ life was his grandmother. The ability to persevere through hardships and trials were her teachings. Lessons also learned were those of strength and determination. The proof of this is evident in a few of his literary works where a mother figure encourages and teaches her child, or student, life lessons on
staying the course. In the poem “Mother to Son” a mother tells of her persistence through life’s obstacles, encouraging her son not to give up.
“Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.”
She starts here with telling her son how hard life has been for her with the mentioning of the metaphor ‘crystal stair’, which is a reference of wealth and reaching the top.
“It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.”
Here she explains why her life hasn’t been a “crystal stair”, and goes into detail about the state of poverty she’s been in.
“But all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,”
Explained here is her method of overcoming the odds. Notice the mentioning of stairs here also. A ‘landin’ or ‘landing’, is a level area on top of a staircase that is usually between one flight of stairs and another. She’s saying here that though climbing life’s stairs came with the addition of hardships, she still managed to reach the next level.
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...
Langston Hughes wrote during a very critical time in American History, the Harlem Renaissance. Hughes wrote many poems, but most of his most captivating works centered around women and power that they hold. They also targeted light and darkness and strength. The Negro Speaks of Rivers and Mother to Son, both explain the importance of the woman, light and darkness and strength in the African-American community. They both go about it in different ways.
Hughes uses figurative language like a metaphor in order to compare the two stairs. The author compares the two sets of stairs to the two types of lives people live: the easy and the difficult life. Hughes describes the easy life as a “crystal stair”, because the reader can imagine this stair being shiny, smooth, and clear. By the stairs being translucent, the author wants to show that the easy life has been planned and their life has a direction towards a great future. Hughes describes the difficult life as one with “tacks in it”, “splinters”, and “bare” because the reader knows that walking on these stairs would be unpleasant
Because of that, his writing seems to manifest a greater meaning. He is part of the African-American race that is expressed in his writing. He writes about how he is currently oppressed, but this does not diminish his hope and will to become the equal man. Because he speaks from the point of view of an oppressed African-American, the poem’s struggles and future changes seem to be of greater importance than they ordinarily would. The point of view of being the oppressed African American is clearly evident in Langston Hughes’s writing.
The mother describes all the different obstacles that can stand in the way along the path of life, but tells her son to continue to climb. “Mother to Son” has been referenced in speeches by Martin Luther King Jr. and President Barack Obama as pieces of human inspiration to continue moving forward even during the tough times (Miller, 425). Langston’s poem represents the relationship between a mother and her child to try to be a support system during difficult times to keep them fighting for more in their life. King and Obama used this same poem to speak to human nature and encourage the movement past difficult events in society (Miller, 425). Langston’s poem shows how it was relevant when it was written, but it is still relevant today since it pulls at who we are as
“Poetry is the rhythmical creation of beauty in words.” –Edgar Allan Poe. Poetry is one of the world’s greatest wonders. It is a way to tell a story, raise awareness of a social or political issue, an expression of emotions, an outlet, and last but not least it is an art. Famous poet Langston Hughes uses his poetry as a musical art form to raise awareness of social injustices towards African-Americans during the time of the Harlem Renaissance. Although many poets share similarities with one another, Hughes creatively crafted his poetry in a way that was only unique to him during the 1920’s. He implemented different techniques and styles in his poetry that not only helped him excel during the 1920’s, but has also kept him relative in modern times. Famous poems of his such as a “Dream Deferred,” and “I, Too, Sing America” are still being studied and discussed today. Due to the cultural and historical events occurring during the 1920’s Langston Hughes was able to implement unique writing characteristics such as such as irregular use of form, cultural and historical referenced themes and musical influences such as Jazz and the blues that is demonstrative of his writing style. Langston Hughes use of distinct characteristics such as irregular use of form, cultural and historical referenced themes and musical influences such as Jazz and the blues helped highlight the plights of African-Americans during the Harlem Renaissance Era.
Like most, the stories we hear as children leave lasting impacts in our heads and stay with us for lifetimes. Hughes was greatly influenced by the stories told by his grandmother as they instilled a sense of racial pride that would become a recurring theme in his works as well as become a staple in the Harlem Renaissance movement. During Hughes’ prominence in the 20’s, America was as prejudiced as ever and the African-American sense of pride and identity throughout the U.S. was at an all time low. Hughes took note of this and made it a common theme to put “the everyday black man” in most of his stories as well as using traditional “negro dialect” to better represent his African-American brethren. Also, at this time Hughes had major disagreements with members of the black middle class, such as W.E.B. DuBois for trying to assimilate and promote more european values and culture, whereas Hughes believed in holding fast to the traditions of the African-American people and avoid having their heritage be whitewashed by black intellectuals.
During the 1920's and 30’s, America went through a period of astonishing artistic creativity, the majority of which was concentrated in one neighborhood of New York City, Harlem. The creators of this period of growth in the arts were African-American writers and other artists. Langston Hughes is considered to be one of the most influential writers of the period know as the Harlem Renaissance. With the use of blues and jazz Hughes managed to express a range of different themes all revolving around the Negro. He played a major role in the Harlem Renaissance, helping to create and express black culture. He also wrote of political views and ideas, racial inequality and his opinion on religion. I believe that Langston Hughes’ poetry helps to capture the era know as the Harlem Renaissance.
Langston Hughes was probably the most well-known literary force during the Harlem Renaissance. He was one of the first known black artists to stress a need for his contemporaries to embrace the black jazz culture of the 1920s, as well as the cultural roots in Africa and not-so-distant memory of enslavement in the United States. In formal aspects, Hughes was innovative in that other writers of the Harlem Renaissance stuck with existing literary conventions, while Hughes wrote several poems and stories inspired by the improvised, oral traditions of black culture (Baym, 2221). Proud of his cultural identity, but saddened and angry about racial injustice, the content of much of Hughes’ work is filled with conflict between simply doing as one is told as a black member of society and standing up for injustice and being proud of one’s identity. This relates to a common theme in many of Hughes’ poems: that dignity is something that has to be fought for by those who are held back by segregation, poverty, and racial bigotry.
Both Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes were great writers but their attitudes towards their personal experience as an African American differed in many ways. These differences can be attributed to various reasons that range from gender to life experience but even though they had different perceptions regarding the African American experience, they both shared one common goal, racial equality through art. To accurately delve into the minds of the writers’ one must first consider authors background such as their childhood experience, education, as well their early adulthood to truly understand how it affected their writing in terms the similarities and differences of the voice and themes used with the works “How it Feels to be Colored Me” by Hurston and Hughes’ “The Negro Mother”. The importance of these factors directly correlate to how each author came to find their literary inspiration and voice that attributed to their works.
In line seventeen, eighteen, and nineteen Hughes says, “Don’t you fall now– For I’se still goin’, honey, I’se still climbin’.” What Hughes expresses in these lines is that just because the stairs become hard to climb at times do not quit. One of Hughes’ most important elements is symbols in his poem “Mother to Son.” She still struggles forward, no matter what may have been the bleakest moments of her life, where there seemed to be no hope. When climbing the stairs she is “reachin’ landin’s, / and turnin’ corners, / and sometimes goin’ in the dark”. Even though these are “home like” things someone may face on a staircase, they are actually metaphors that mean things that she has encountered in her life. She says that she reaches landings, which can mean that she has come up on places where she could rest. When she says she turns corners, it is when her life changes and she has to turn away from her original path that it was on. When she says “sometimes goin’ in the dark where there ain’t been no light.” This contrasting color imagery of dark and light shows the idea that it is always dark before the dawn and bad days come before better ones and just when it might seem as if there is no relief in sight, something occurs to get rid of all of your burdens. The mother then advises her son not to give up and let life get him down just because there are a few struggles in
The extended metaphor throughout the poem compares their life to a crystal stair. The speaker talks about climbing up the stair which is like going through years of
Mother describes how life shouldn’t be interpreted to be handed on a silver plate, but with hard work. The author portrays this symbol between conversation and
The speaker starts the poem by saying “Well, son, I’ll tell you:” (1), this is the speaker’s way of getting her sons attention. It is easy to relate to as one can relate to his or her mother trying to grab his or her attention. In the next line the speaker introduces a metaphor to set up the next few lines by saying “Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair” (2). A crystal stair represents life without a struggle as it is clear and life without struggles should be smooth. From the next few lines it is easy to see that this is meant as a metaphor because the speaker’s life had been the total opposite. The speaker builds on the metaphor in the following lines by showing how rugged the steps are in order to show how hard her life has
The metaphor in this poem conjoins life, and a staircase, "Well, son, I'll tell you:/ life for me ain't been no crystal stair. " The mother says to her son, that life is not an easy journey that can be stroll through.. Instead, in this passage of the poem, she tells her son that life is hard, full of stumbling blocks, but one must keep climbing, one cannot turn back or sit down, because one will catch a break, a turn, a landing, and keep going. She uses the "crystal stair," to describe a life that is opposite to hers. Crystal is thought of as something delicate, precious, and valuable; every step of life on a crystal stair would be full of priceless opportunities.