Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Dream Deferred

"Dream Deferred" by Langston Hughes
"Or does it explode?" (Hughes).

Question two at the end of the poem poses an interesting thought that I thought of myself once I notices Hughes was the author. From the context of Hughes' life, I decided the poem most similarly discussed the stuggles of a black man in the United States. The many similes and metaphor in the poem leave different images that seem to coincide with the different emotions a black person could feel in the society he lived in. The first simile provokes a feeling of shrinking, the next injury, and the next disgust. Furthermore, the rest of the language allows for feeling sof unappealing, inhibiting, and exploded. All of these emotions seem to add up to Hughes' feelings of uninvited tension between himself and the society he lived in. With emphasis on the last line with italics, Hughes seems to prevail that the last feeling he felt could have been a positive explosion that could correlate with the Civil Rights movement. Lastly, Hughes' open ended questions lead to believe that maybe he is unsure himself of what he is feeling. Maybe Hughes is leaving the questions open ended so each person in his similar situation can answer the questions themselves to relate to his feelings. The open ended questions leave the reader with a thought of wonder of what he is referring to as a dream deferred.

No comments:

Post a Comment