Comparing The Harlem Renaissance And Langston Hughes

The Harlem Renaissance and Langston Hughes have a special connection with each other because of the significance of the time period. For one, the Harlem Renaissance occurred from 1920-1935 which corresponded with the age of Jazz and the start of recorded music along with the radio becoming popular. Hughes’ poetry and writing captures the essence of the age and his autobiography The Big Sea offers a story of an individual striving to overcome racial barriers to success (Enotes). The 1920’s became the rise of pop music, also known as jazz, which became popular through the help of the radio. Since Hughes was born in 1902 with his early life beginning in New York, he was well aware of the musical style of the time therefore, making it easier for

him to include in his poetry. One of Hughes’s biggest achievements and contributions to American Literature was his invention of poetry that reflected the experience of pain known as blues poems.
In 1921, Hughes returns to the United States and enrolls at Columbia University to study briefly and then becomes a part of Harlem’s cultural movement, the Harlem Renaissance (bio). He states that “I was in love with Harlem Long before I got there. Had I been a rich young man, I would have bought a house in Harlem and built musical steps up to the front door, and installed chimes that at the press of button played Ellington tunes” (Rampersad 51). His words illustrate the love he has for Harlem and for the music at the time. Hughes enjoys Duke Ellington’s music because he was an influential jazz musician who was boasted by Harlem’s cotton club (ushistory). After watching a performance called Shuffle Along, a show played, produced, and written by African Americans for African Americans, became the primary reason Hughes wanted to go to Columbia University. Many African American artists, musicians, writers, and entrepreneurs from all over the country were inspired to move to Harlem and Hughes was one of them.
By the 1920’s black music became popular almost instantaneously and the primary reason for that was the blues. The blues made black celebrities such as Bessie Smith and Billie Holiday famous because of their blues music and jazz vocals (ushistory). Hughes references the blues as “For as sad as blues may be, there is always something humorous about them, even if it’s the kind of humor that laughs to keep from crying”. The blue became nationally known and Harlem became the center of this music. With the help of two popular locations, many artists, writers, and musicians became known. The first was the Cotton Club where Duke Ellington played. In the Cotton Club the musicians were black however the audience was white (ushistory). The second most popular blues venue was the Savoy Ballroom. It was known to be one of the most beautiful ballrooms and was used to showcase many musical talents (pbs).
Before the Savoy even opened, Alain Locke, a Harvard graduate known to be the first African American Rhodes scholar, publishes The New Negro.

It contains poetry and essays, which Hughes contributes to, that offers an outline of the significance of black culture. Hughes questions black art more specifically than Locke who was more conservative. Locke imagines that blacks would adapt whereas Hughes wants separate identity for African Americans. In his essay “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain”, Hughes explains that true black art was racial art that gives away with the “mountain,” a metaphor that symbolizes the obstacles and dangers of adaptation into a white world. However, many of Hughes’s own poems were related to race and the way they were

treated.
By the early twenties, Hughes had countless influences that would impact his blues poetry writing. Three of the most influential people were Carl Sandburg, Nicholas Vachel Lindsay, and Walt Whitman. In a biography of Hughes, Arnold Rampersad states that Whitman and Sandburg lead Hughes into a social change (Peck). The two poets have a well placement of words in their free verse that leaves a powerful impact on the reader whether it is spoken aloud or read in silence. Hughes met Vachel Lindsay while working as a busboy at Wardman Park Hotel. Lindsay read Hughes’ poems and publicized his discovery of a new black poet (poemhunter). He was described as “poetic singer” who combined poetry with chants and attempted to bring the artist, the poem, and the audience closer together.
Besides these white poets, there were many important black poets in Hughes’ life as well.

Paul Laurence Dunbar, however, serves as a negative example for Hughes. Dunbar uses dialect in his verse that sound overtone whereas Hughes uses dialect in his blues poems but in an entirely different way. Even though Dunbar was one of the most renowned African American writers, praised by both black and whites, some critics criticized him as sentimental and stereotypical. Two other influential black writers during the Harlem Renaissance were W. E. B. Dubois and James Weldon Johnson. Along with Locke, these two also reputed the Negro spiritual as the “folk gift” of black music. Therefore, they rejected blues and jazz because they thought they were not serious forms of music. James Weldon Johnson was known to be a father figure to many young writers including Hughes (English). Since Hughes admired him, Johnson’s style of writing have impressed him as well. Johnson even read Hughes’s “The Weary Blues” aloud at a banquet in 1925 held by Opportunity magazine

(kansasheritage).
Unlike Dubois and Johnson, Hughes truly believes that the blues are an integral part of the African American culture and that they shape the religious aspect as well. Hughes faces many challenges while trying to create blues poems. For one, a blues poem has to have the same stanza form as blues lyrics. A more commonly known stanza will be represented as AAB meaning that the second line, called the repeat line, echoes the first, and the third line, called the response line, can justify the first two lines. Other possible combinations of stanzas for blues poems are: ABC and ABB. Aside from formal aspects, Hughes had to figure out the social associations of the blues as well. Since blues music was suitable for the working class, it was perfect for Hughes even though he was skeptical about the popularity of African Americans. Ironically, the Cotton Club, who followed the Jim Crow Segregation, turned down a fellow Negro while his band was playing his music (ushistory). Blues lyrics also displayed vulgar language but Hughes tried to avoid that in his poems.