January 14, 2016
samueldpoetry
Gallery, Non African Analysis
The title of A Raisin in the Sun comes from the poem "Harlem: A Dream Deferred" by Langston Hughes (1951). Hughes was a prominent black poet during 1920s Harlem Renaissance in New York City, during which black artists of all kinds_ musicians, poets, writers_ gave innovative voices to their personal and cultural experiences. The Harlem Renaissance was a time of immense promise and hopefulness for black artists, as their efforts were noticed and applauded across the United States. In fact, the 1920s are known to history as the Jazz Age, since that musical form, created by a vanquard of black musicians, gained immense national popularity during the period and seemed to embody the exuberance and excitement of the decade. The Harlem Renaissance and the positive national response to the art it produced seemed to herald the possibilities of a new age of acceptance for blacks in America.
[Read: 3 Themes in The Blood of a Stranger]
Langston Hughes was one of the brightest lights of the Harlem Renaissance, and his poems and essays celebrate black culture, creativity, and strength. However, Hughes wrote "Harlem" in 1951, twenty years after the Great Depression crushed the Harlem Renaissance and devastated black communities more terribly than any other group in the United States. In addition, the post-World War II years of 1950s were characterized by "white flight", in which whites fled the cities in favour of the rapidly growing suburbs. Blacks were often left behind in deteriorating cities, and were unwelcome in the suburbs. In a time of renewed prosperity, blacks were for the most part left behind. The poem reads:
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore_
And th
en run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over_
Like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
Like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
(c) copyright Langston Hughes
In the poem, Hughes creates vivid images of what happens when a dream becomes postponed, or lost. It dries, it rots, it festers, it sags and it explodes. There is a frustration and sadness in the inability to bring a dream to fruition. The images all seem to drag the speaker down, except for that last one where the frustration potentially bubbles in an explosion.
"Harlem" captures the tension between the need for black expression and the impossibility of that expression because of American society's oppression of its black population. In the poem, Hughes asks whether a "dream deferred"_ a dream put on hold_ withers up "like a raisin in the sun." His lines confront the racist and dehumanizing attitude prevalent in the American society before the civil rights movement of the 1960s that black desires and ambitions were, at best, unimportant and should be ignored, and it worst, should be forcibly resisted. His closing rhetorical question_ "Or does it (a dream deferred) explode?"_ is provocative, a bold statement that the suppression of black dreams might result in an eruption. It implicitly places the blame for this possible eruption on the oppressive society that forces the dream to be deferred. Hansberry's reference to Hughes's poem in her play's title highlights the importance of dreams in "A Raisin In The Sun" and the struggle that her characters face to realize their individual dreams, a struggle inextricably tied to the more fundamental black dream of equality in America.
[Article Source: excerpt from Exam Focus for Literature In English]
[READ MORE POETIC ANALYSIS >>> In Time of Silver Rain by Langston Hughes 10 Facts]
Samuel C. Enunwa aka samueldpoetry
(the Leo with wings flying)
[Read: 3 Themes in The Blood of a Stranger]
Langston Hughes was one of the brightest lights of the Harlem Renaissance, and his poems and essays celebrate black culture, creativity, and strength. However, Hughes wrote "Harlem" in 1951, twenty years after the Great Depression crushed the Harlem Renaissance and devastated black communities more terribly than any other group in the United States. In addition, the post-World War II years of 1950s were characterized by "white flight", in which whites fled the cities in favour of the rapidly growing suburbs. Blacks were often left behind in deteriorating cities, and were unwelcome in the suburbs. In a time of renewed prosperity, blacks were for the most part left behind. The poem reads:
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore_
And th
en run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over_
Like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
Like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
(c) copyright Langston Hughes
In the poem, Hughes creates vivid images of what happens when a dream becomes postponed, or lost. It dries, it rots, it festers, it sags and it explodes. There is a frustration and sadness in the inability to bring a dream to fruition. The images all seem to drag the speaker down, except for that last one where the frustration potentially bubbles in an explosion.
"Harlem" captures the tension between the need for black expression and the impossibility of that expression because of American society's oppression of its black population. In the poem, Hughes asks whether a "dream deferred"_ a dream put on hold_ withers up "like a raisin in the sun." His lines confront the racist and dehumanizing attitude prevalent in the American society before the civil rights movement of the 1960s that black desires and ambitions were, at best, unimportant and should be ignored, and it worst, should be forcibly resisted. His closing rhetorical question_ "Or does it (a dream deferred) explode?"_ is provocative, a bold statement that the suppression of black dreams might result in an eruption. It implicitly places the blame for this possible eruption on the oppressive society that forces the dream to be deferred. Hansberry's reference to Hughes's poem in her play's title highlights the importance of dreams in "A Raisin In The Sun" and the struggle that her characters face to realize their individual dreams, a struggle inextricably tied to the more fundamental black dream of equality in America.
[Article Source: excerpt from Exam Focus for Literature In English]
[READ MORE POETIC ANALYSIS >>> In Time of Silver Rain by Langston Hughes 10 Facts]
Samuel C. Enunwa aka samueldpoetry
(the Leo with wings flying)
Popular Posts
-
Back in 1996, a little movie arrived on screens in the form of The Craft, and an instant cult classic was born. In the 24 years since, passi...
-
TITLE: The Leader and the Led POET: Niyi Osundare OTHER POEMS: They Too Are the Earth GENRE: Poetry CATEGORY: Fable DEN...
-
Charlie Hunnam is the most interesting of movie stars. His latest, Jungleland, stars the British thespian as one half of a brotherly duo tha...
-
Happy Halloween!! Sorry, we are not highlighting any spooky fare in this post because networks have already blown past Halloween and Thanks...
-
Christmas movies continue to keep us yearning for happier days, but there's also a lot of good TV on the way this week. With veterans ...
-
Narrative Style In Lonely Days By Bayo Adebowale With the help of well chosen narrative styles; Bayo Adebowale drove his message into th...
-
Once in a blue moon, a super sugary sweet movie comes along from Disney that screams the Mouse House. In 2007, that movie was Enchanted wit...
-
We are going to kick start this article by looking at the style and figurative. Based on naijapoets.com opinion, Nightfall in Soweto by O...
-
This post tends to point at few themes in the Kofi Awoonor's "The Anvil And The Hammer" ; in order to get larger discussion ab...
-
When it comes to the analysis of The Proud King by William Morris, naijapoets.com has taken time to examine the poem and compare it with o...

Article Index
- 10 analysis of poem by george herbert
- 10 analyzed poems about wind
- 19th century poet
- 20 places to find inspiration to rite poem
- 3 poetic devices in vanity by birago diop
- 3 themes in the African child by camara laye
- 4 analysis of poem by philip larkin
- 4 analyzed poems of Pablo Neruda
- 4 p every poet must practice regularly
- 4 qualities of a sapiopoem
- 5 analysis of poem by t. s. eliot
- 5 analyzed poem of andrew marvell
- 6 analysis of poem by wallace stevens
- 6 analyzed homecoming poem
- 6 interesting analysis of classic nigerian poets
- 7 summer poems
- 8 analysis of poems by alfred lord tennyson
- A Name In The Sand
- a raisin in the sun by lorraine hansberry
- African Analysis
- Afterwards by Thomas Hardy
- Aiding blogspot traffic with WordPress
- all the world a stage
- aloho as a victim of circumstance
- Analysis of a gravestone by William Allingham
- analysis of a poem of changgan by li po
- analysis of a postcard from the volcano
- Analysis of Abiku by Wole Soyinka
- Analysis of Agbor Dancer by john pepper clark
- analysis of busconductor by Roger McGough
- analysis of desiderata by max ehrmann
- Analysis of Fulani Creation Story
- Analysis of I Think It Rains by Wole Soyinka
- Analysis of Ibadan by John Pepper Clark
- analysis of in dependence by sarah ladipo manyika
- Analysis of In Memory of Anyone Unknown to Me by Elizabeth Jennings
- Analysis of Invictus by William Ernest Henley
- Analysis of Lament of the Frontier Guard by Ezra Pound
- analysis of locust by femi osofisan
- analysis of my grandmother by elizabeth jennings
- Analysis of My Sister by Liz Lochhead
- analysis of night by Wole Soyinka
- Analysis of olokun by j.p. Clark
- analysis of outsider by Michael Echeruo
- analysis of report to wordsworth by kim boey cheng
- Analysis of Sonnet 10 by William Shakespeare
- analysis of story of isaac by leonard cohen
- analysis of supplication by kunle akinsemoyin
- analysis of the lilies of the field by Reginald Heber
- analysis of the north ship by philip larkin
- analysis of the school of night
- Analysis of the white man's burden by Rudyard Kipling
- Analysis of to his coy mistress by andrew marvell
- analysis of with a water lily by henrik ibsen
- analysis of young africa plea by dennis osadebay
- Analyzed At Day Closed in November by Thomas Hardy
- Anthology Publishing
- Aqua Laluah poetry quote
- Baby T as a victim of social injustice
- blood of a stranger by dele charley
- boy on a swing
- chinese-english poetry
- Classic Love Life
- creating poetry audio book
- death and life
- End of War by Okinba Launko
- faceless by amma darko
- fame is a food that dead men eat
- Finery by Jane Taylor
- Five Ways To Kill A Man
- getting leads for poetry blog
- Give me the minstrel's seat
- half past two by u a fanthorpe
- Heidegger's Experiment
- homecoming by sly Cheney cooker
- Houseboy by Ferdinand L Oyono
- how to analyze a poem
- how well do you understand poetry
- Hurrah for Thunder
- Imagery in Salute to the Elephant by Babalola Adeboye
- in the bazaars of hyperabad
- kindle fire 10
- kofi.awoonor.song
- kongi's harvest by Wole Soyinka
- listen comrades by david diop
- Literary Devices in Birches by Robert Frost
- Literature Heads Up
- Literature-In-English
- London 1802
- lord jim by joseph conrad
- Lord of my life by rabindrabath Tagore
- love poem by pablo neruda
- my dreams my works must wait till after hell
- my native land
- naija poets analysis
- naijapoets analysis
- Narrative styles in lonely days by Bayo Adebowale
- Nausea by Jean Paul Sartre
- night rain by john pepper clark
- no coffin no grave by jared angira
- Non African Analysis
- ode to onion by Pablo Neruda
- ours to plough not to plunder
- ozone layer poem
- piano and drums by gabriel okara
- poetic analysis
- poetry as a freelance niche
- Poetry Open Mic
- poets and email marketing
- praise of a little woman by juan ruiz
- principle for building audience
- Reasons poetry cause headache
- Revolution and Struggle for Freedom
- sans teeth sans eyes
- setting and style in letter to martha 17 by Brutus Dennis
- sweet sixteen by Bolaji Abdullahi
- T S Eliot Murder in the Cathedral
- tess of the d'urbervilles
- the concubine by elechi amadi
- The Dining Table by Gbanabom Hallowell's
- The Schoolboy by William Blake
- the theme of supernatural
- The vagabond by R. L. Stevenson
- Theme of Mistaken Identity in the Rival by Richard Sheridan
- theme of past mistakes
- Themes of Dry Your Tears Africa by Bernard Daddie
- They Too Are The Earth
- vanity by birago diop
- Video Analysis of Faceless by Amma Darko
- watch youtube analysis of lonely days by bayo adebowale
- wuthering heights by emily bronte
