Comparing The Poetry Of Langston Hughes And Countee Cullen

The Harlem Renaissance brought forth a new type poetry by African Americans about their lives and the injustices they faced in the northern part of the United States. Many poets arose from the Harlem Renaissance, two of these poets being Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen. There are tons of different poets, however these two poets, Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen, remain amongst two of the most important and famous poets of the Harlem Renaissance. The Harlem Renaissance itself remains one of the most important times in the history of the United States, especially for African Americans living in the United States..

The Harlem Renaissance happened during the 1920s and 1930s. Nonetheless, it started “when the U.S. entered World War I in 1917,

jobs previously held by white males suddenly became available, and industrial expansion in the North provided opportunities for African Americans to seek a new lifestyle.” (poets.org) One of these places being New York City, more specifically, in the district of Harlem. Many African Americans came here seeking a better lifestyle as there were lots of jobs available here. Of course, the war ended and so African Americans that went to Harlem for a job stayed in Harlem, sparking the start of the Harlem Renaissance. The Harlem Renaissance itself is a culmination of many different types of artistic means and literature of the African American culture in Harlem, including art, music such as jazz, novels, poems, and many more forms of art and literature. “The movement was key to developing a new sense of Black identity and aesthetics as writers, visual artists, and musicians articulated new modes of African-American experience and experimented with artistic forms, modernist techniques, and folk culture.” (poetryfoundation.org) Each form of art and literature cover many different things; however, poetry is on the more darker side when compared to the other forms of art and literature. Poetry mainly discussed “the influence of slavery, black identity, the effects of institutional racism, and how to convey the experience of modern black life in the urban North.” (boundless.com) Most poetry of the Harlem Renaissance touched on at least one of these subjects, depicting the harsh life of African Americans living in Harlem during this time period. There are many notable poets that should come to mind when talking about the Harlem Renaissance, these people being “Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Claude McKay, and Arna Bontemps.” (poetryfoundation.org) Each of them touched on various social problems that African Americans faced in that time period and played major roles in making the Harlem Renaissance into what it is known as today. These poets also used different styles, for example, Claude McKay who would use sonnets to combat racial violence.
One of the poems of this time period is called “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” which is written by none other than Langston Hughes, one of the most important, if not, the most important and most noted poet of the Harlem Renaissance.

This was actually his first poem, and was highly praised by critics. The poem is essentially talking about how his people have used rivers from ancient times to present times, and how his people are related to the rivers. “The refrain, “My soul has grown deep like the rivers”. links the movement and endurance and power of the great rivers to black history.” (enotes) The emphasis of the world “I,” which is repeated in lines four through seven, is not necessarily just one speaker, but instead black people as a whole. Since the poem, specifically in the parts where he mentions “I,” has various distant locations where generations of his people were usually around. Some proof of this is in line five where he says “I built my hut near the Congo” and in line seven where he states “I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans” shows that two dissimilar people from two contrastive time periods are describing an event near a river. These are probably not the same person, despite each sentence starting with “I.” This poem primarily emphasizes the importance of black identity, which is one of the subjects that the poetry of the Harlem Renaissance touched on. Due to the poem talking about his ancient people, you can tell

that Langston Hughes did very much care about his people and their history. This, once again, emphasizes Langston Hughes’ importance of black identity, since many of his poems were revolved around this, this poem is no exception and in fact is a perfect example of what Langston’s philosophy was when it came to African American poetry. Another thing that this poem talked about was slavery. In line seven, it states "I heard the singing of the Mississippi River…” The Mississippi River was a symbol a slavery, as “people who were enslaved and who were working in this area from time to time sought freedom by escaping across the Mississippi River,” (wric) The singing described can be the singing of enslaved African Americans, singing songs about wanting freedom as they worked in the plantations. This also connects with the importance of black identity, as this singing would have happened before Langston Hughes wrote this poem. Once again, he is acknowledging his people’s history and emphasizing the importance of it.
Another poem during the Harlem Renaissance, called “Incident,” was written by Countee Cullen.

This poem is about an incident of racism that happened to the narrator earlier in his young life. The thing about this poem is that the event that happened in the poem was so random, the narrator was just called a racial slur out of nowhere. In lines one and two, we can see that the narrator is happy strolling around in Baltimore. There is also some alliteration going on in line two, where there is “repeated H sounds in “heart” and “head.”” (Shmoop) And then suddenly in line eight we can see that this happiness was suddenly ruined because another kid that did not appear to be any older than the narrator (at the age of eight) just said a racial slur to the narrator without any reason to do so. This memory in Baltimore has been stuck with the narrator for the rest of his life, as in stanza three the narrator revealed that throughout all seven months in Baltimore, which is kind of a long time, this event was the only thing that he remembered from his trip in Baltimore. This memory probably struck the narrator for a long time because this might have been his first instance of “in-your-face” racism, where it is just blatant racism. This might have been his first instance because in line five it is revealed that he is only eight years of age and very small. A kid this age should not be exposed to these types of words, because as we can see it has stuck with the narrator’s whole life.

Another thing to point out is that in line six, ““whit” also irresistibly suggests both “white” and “wit.”” (English.ill.edu) This subtle foreshadowing shows that the person that called the narrator the racial slur was white. Due to this, it is obvious that this poem is another poem about racial inequality and how white people thought that they were superior to blacks. The whole topic of racism is also an enormous part of the Harlem Renaissance, this poem is an exceptional example of racism during the Harlem Renaissance, where white people would, for no reason, be racist towards African American individuals.
In conclusion, the Harlem Renaissance is an important time in the United States’ history, especially for African Americans, because it broke the racial stereotypes that many people that were not African Americans had about African Americans. Although racial inequality was still a thing after the Harlem Renaissance, there is no denying that the Harlem Renaissance changed the way people thought about race and racism. Both poems, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” and Incident” are both perfect examples of two different topics that were expressed in the Harlem Renaissance, both of those being black identity and racism. Although both of these poems were different when it came to the message of each poems, both of them sought out to reveal what it was actually like living as an African American during the Harlem Renaissance, where racial inequality was a big negative part of African American’s lives, and that is what defined the Harlem Renaissance. It really showed how rich in culture African Americans were, and how important it is to them, which was a step on the long road of terminating racial inequality in the United States of America.