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A literary analysis by maya angelou
A literary analysis by maya angelou
A literary analysis by maya angelou
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“I've learned that you shouldn't go through life with a catcher's mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back” (brainyquote.com). Being an African-American woman growing up in the early-mid 1900’s, Angelou quickly learned to “throw things back” at ridiculers. Maya Angelou is an author who has inspired people across the globe through her writing. Angelou experienced racial prejudice early in her life, and persevered to find her writing voice (bio.com) Angelou mainly writes about civil and women’s rights, giving a voice of hope to those that feel oppressed. Overall, Angelou is a spirited poet that has rallied millions across the globe with her works, by giving comfort to those in need, and by giving hope to the hopeless. Maya Angelou was a highly skilled poet who used her writer’s voice to strengthen and guide civil rights. Angelou was born in St. Louis on the 4th of April, 1928 and is still currently writing (bio.com). A victim of sexual assault, Angelou spent years after as a virtual mute (poetryfoundation.org). Facing racial prejudice and discrimination through all her youth, a lot of her works were centred around prejudice and civil rights (poetryfoundation.org). Angelou is a strong civil rights activist and her writings such as I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings certainly reflect that. Angelou was an influential and passionate person with strong motives . Angelou was the first African-American woman to have a non-fiction bestseller, impacting the literature world (bio.com). Angelou was a coordinator of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and worked with Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X to bolster civil rights (poetryfoundation.com). Overall, Angelou’s works have affected not only poetry but fr... ... middle of paper ... ...lers. Being a great writer with a great mind, she is well deserving of her respectable reputation. “I’ve learned that people will forget you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel (brainyquote.com).” Overall, Angelou is a great writer that has helped millions, and people will never forget how she made them feel. Works Cited "A Look At Maya Angelou's On the Pulse of Morning. Cyberlearning-world.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Jan. 2014. (3) "Maya Angelou." : The Poetry Foundation. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2014. (1) "Maya Angelou." Poets.org. Academy of American Poets, n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2014. (2) ""An Interpretation of "on the Pulse of Morning"" StudyMode. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Jan 2014. (4) BrainyQuote. Xplore, n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2014. (5) "Maya Angelou Biography." Bio.com. A&E Networks Television, n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2014. (6)
New Essays on The Awakening. Ed. Wendy Martin. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1988.
Maya Angelou was raised in segregated rural Arkansas. She is a poet, historian, author, actress, playwright, civil-rights activist, producer and director. She lectures throughout the United States and abroad and is Reynolds professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University in North Carolina since 1981. She has published ten best selling books and numerous magazine articles earning her Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award nominations. At the request of President Clinton, she wrote and delivered a poem at his 1993 Presidential Inauguration.
Maya Angelou is one of the well-respected African-American women figures. Maya is a poet, actress, civil right activist, dancer, singer, writer, educator, and a director. Maya’s real name is Marguerite Johnson. Maya was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on April 4, 1928. Maya’s parents divorced when she was three. She was sent to live with her brother and grandmother in Stamps, Arkansas. She was very close to her brother Bailey and her brother named her Maya. When she lived in Arkansas, she experienced discrimination towards African-American. At the age of seven Maya was sexually assaulted by her mother’s boyfriend. “She only told her brother,” but a few days later her uncle has murdered the man who assaulted her. She thought her words have killed
Chopin, Kate. “The Awakening.” 1899. The Awakening and Selected Stories. New York City, NY: Penguin Group, 2003.
All in all, Maya Angelou's poems have became more inspirational as there years went on and the African Americans got the rights they deserved. She used imagery and a lot of emotions through her poems, as if you could feel the pain they had went through. Her poems had plenty of hope in them. She was hoping for the best during the Civil Rights Movement. In I Know Why The Cage Birds Sing, you can feel how that poem changed from the negative times to the positive. She talked about how the American Dream of giving blacks rights before the movement they had no hope, but as the poem went on you can feel a more positive vibe of hope.
Born to a decaying marriage and unstable household, Maya Angelou thrills her poetic intentions through her dominant and eloquent words. Maya Angelou, center of the mysterious and descendants of the broken, like a champion, rose out of the ashes and into the lights of the stage. An American author and artist who has been called “America’s most visible black female autobiographer” by dozens of people, has made remarkable recognition all around the world. She is best known for her sequence of six autobiographical stories, focusing on her childhood and early adulthood. Her writing, through the eyes and experiences of a black woman, can lend a structure to the study of racial relations and culture in the 20th century America.
Maya Angelou was one of America’s greatest writers in history. She was known for her many writings and for her part in Civil Rights Movements. Maya Angelou went through many hardships during her childhood, the most prevalent of those, racism over her skin color. This racism affected where she grew up, where she went to school, even where she got a job. “My education and that of my Black associates were quite different from the education of our white schoolmates. In the classroom we all learned past participles, but in the streets and in our homes the Blacks learned to drops s’s from plurals and suffixes from past tense verbs.” (Angelou 221) Maya Angelou was a strong believer in a good education and many of those beliefs were described in her
when Maya Angelou was a young woman -- "in the crisp days of my youth," she says -- she carried with her a secret conviction that she wouldn't live past the age of 28. Raped by her mother's boyfriend at 8 and a mother herself since she graduated from high school, she supported herself and her son, Guy, through a series of careers and buoyed by an implacable ambition to escape what might have been a half-lived, ground-down life of poverty and despair. "For it is hateful to be young, bright, ambitious and poor," Angelou observes. "The added insult is to be aware of one's poverty." In "Even the Stars Look Lonesome," her new collection of reflective autobiographical essays, Angelou gives no further explanation for her "profound belief" that she would die young.
Maya Angelou is one of most well-known poets ever. Her work is a reflection of her hardships during her childhood and her life as an adult. She expressed many of her opinions through her poetry and other writing. Many of her poems revolve around equality and freedom because she grew up in the segregated era and worked with civil right activist. The poems she writes are to inspire the lives of others. Till this day, Maya Angelou is still continuing to write inspiring poetry.
Born on April 4th, 1928, in St. Louis, Missouri, Dr. Angelou was raised in St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas. In Stamps, Dr. Angelou experienced the brutality of racial discrimination, but she also absorbed the unshakable faith and values of traditional African-American family, community, and culture. Dr. Maya Angelou is one of the most renowned and influential voices of our time. Hailed as a global renaissance woman, Dr. Angelou is a celebrated poet, memoirist, novelist, educator, dramatist, producer, actress, historian, filmmaker, and civil rights activist.
Chopin, Kate. Walker, Nancy A. ed. The Awakening Boston, NY Bedford Books of St. Martin's Press. (c) 1993.
The early 1930’s a time where segregation was still an issue in the United States it was especially hard for a young African American girl who is trying to grow and become an independent woman. At this time, many young girls like Maya Angelou grew up wishing they were a white woman with blond hair and blue eyes. That was just the start of Angelou's problems though. In the autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou goes into great depth about her tragic childhood, from moving around to different houses, and running away and having a child at the age of 16. This shows how Maya overcame many struggles as a young girl.
“To be awake means to be alive”, and to be awake during the time of Romanticism meant one could witness literature as an intellectual achievement. Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Walt Whitman were three authors during this time that wrote about an idea that would later become the theme of many papers, discussions and lectures, Wakefulness. Though some may not have recognized the significance of these authors’ work at the time, their ideas and beliefs have captivated the minds of many people. Wakefulness, the idea of intellectual exertion throughout everyday life is essential to becoming self-reliant, creating a more intellectual and better community, and becoming closer to god.
In her first autobiography, Maya Angelou tells about her childhood through her graduation through, “Graduation”, from “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” when she is about to graduate. She starts as an excited graduate because she was finally going to receive her diploma, a reward for all her academic accomplishments. On the day of her graduation finally comes, that happiness turns into doubt about her future as she believes that black people will be nothing more than potential athletes or servants to white people. It wasn’t until Henry Reed started to sing the Negro National Anthem that she felt on top of the world again. Throughout her graduation she felt excited to disappointed, until Henry Reed sang and made her feel better.