The Lynching By Claude Mckay Essay

Lynching: the practice of hanging and killing an African-American in expression of pure and utter hatred. In the 1800’s through the 1960’s Lynching was very popular, over 3,446 African-Americans were lynched ( ). During this time frame, Americans had little to no sympathy for African-Americans. They punished them by lynching and burning them, they also taught their children to hate so they can raise their children to hate too. Claude Mckay's poem describes how children dance around a lynched body.

In the poem, “The Lynching” by Claude McKay, a group of people lynch an African-American male by hanging him and burning him without showing any sympathy. Many of them did not want to gaze at the charred body, “The women thronged to look, but never a one/Showed sorrow in her eyes of steely blue” (McKay 11/12). But they didn't hesitate to “Dance round the dreadful thing in fiendish glee” (McKay 14). In the following quote it shows how children did not feel sympathy.

In “The Lynching”, the author uses an allusion to compare to the story of Jesus and the way he descended to Heaven.

In the quote, “His spirit is smoke ascended to high heaven./His father, by the cruelest way of pain,/Had bidden him to his bosom once again;/The awful sin remained still unforgiven” (McKay 1/4). This is an allusion to the story of Jesus’s because it is similar to the way Jesus was killed. It describes how his spirit floated up to heaven like smoke. In addition, there is also irony in the poem. In the quote “All night a bright and solitary star/(Perchance the one that ever guided him, Yet gave him up at last to Fate's wild whim)” (McKay 5/7). This shows irony because it refers to the north star, which he followed to get to the better land. In which eventually killed

him.
The author's tone of this poem is hopeless, because the author thinks that the people who lynched African-Americans have no sympathy for the men that they have hung. In addition, he mentions how children dance around in a happy state. Also, McKay uses language to physically describe the difference between whites and blacks at the time. In the quote, “The women thronged to look, but never a one/Showed sorrow in her eyes of steely blue” (Mckay ); McKay uses “her eyes of steely blue” to emphasize where their hatred comes from. I think that McKay is trying to say that their steely blue eyes are emotionless, and so are their children who have been oblvious to the lynching.
Also, McKay structures his 14 line poem in a sonnet format. He uses enjambments to make his sentences stand out. He also wants us to pause and sink in the fact that children were happy about an African-American being lynched. He puts emphasis on it it because it vividly describes how whites felt about African-Americans at the time.
In “The Lynching”, author Claude Mckay successfully describes the way people didn't have sympathy for those who they lynched. He uses strong language and allusions to make his point across that people at the time did not care about lynching a black man.