Let America Be America Again Langstong Hughes

Andrew has a bully interest in all aspects of verse and writes extensively on the subject. His poems are published online and in impress.

Langston Hughes

Langston Hughes And A Summary of "Let America Be America Over again"

"Let America Be America Again" focuses on the idea of the American dream and how, for many, attaining freedom, equality, and happiness, which the dream encapsulates, is nigh on impossible.

The speaker in the poem outlines the reasons why this ideal America has gone, or never was, only could even so be.

For the poor, the oppressed and the downtrodden, the reality of twenty-four hour period to day existence makes the dream a barbarous illusion. The poem explores the darker areas of life, the history of exploitation for example, and outlines the unique struggles of the poor who make up America, both blackness and white.

Whilst pessimistic and difficult hitting, the poem does accept an optimistic ending and lights the fashion forward with hope.

Langston Hughes was going through a hard period in his life when he wrote this poem. He knew he wanted to earn a living through writing, but couldn't sustain his efforts, despite poesy book publication, almost notably The Weary Blues.

It was on a train journeying through Depression-struck America in 1935 that inspired him to pen this classic plea for a resurgence of the true American spirit.

Publication followed in the Esquire magazine and Hughes went on to become a noted if controversial figure in the world of blackness literature, following his earlier piece of work in the so-called Harlem Renaissance, an upbeat black creative movement peaking in the 1920s.

"Let America Be America Again" reflects the many influences in Hughes'south poetry - from the expansive work of Whitman to street language, from jazz rhythm to the steady iambic lines of earlier blackness poets such as Paul Laurence Dunbar.

Let America Be America Once more

Permit America be America again.

Let it exist the dream it used to be.

Allow it be the pioneer on the plain

Seeking a dwelling where he himself is free.

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(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—

Allow it be that great strong land of love

Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme

That any human be crushed by one above.

(Information technology never was America to me.)

O, permit my land be a land where Liberty

Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,

But opportunity is real, and life is costless,

Equality is in the air nosotros breathe.

(At that place's never been equality for me,

Nor liberty in this "homeland of the costless.")

Say, who are y'all that mumbles in the dark?

And who are y'all that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,

I am the Negro bearing slavery'due south scars.

I am the red human driven from the land,

I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—

And finding only the same old stupid plan

Of dog eat dog, of mighty beat out the weak.

I am the immature homo, total of strength and hope,

Tangled in that ancient endless chain

Of turn a profit, ability, proceeds, of grab the state!

Of grab the aureate! Of grab the ways of satisfying demand!

Of piece of work the men! Of take the pay!

Of owning everything for one's ain greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.

I am the worker sold to the machine.

I am the Negro, servant to you all.

I am the people, apprehensive, hungry, mean—

Hungry yet today despite the dream.

Beaten even so today—O, Pioneers!

I am the human being who never got ahead,

The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Still I'm the i who dreamt our basic dream

In the Old Earth while still a serf of kings,

Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so truthful,

That even even so its mighty daring sings

In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

That'south made America the land it has become.

O, I'm the human who sailed those early seas

In search of what I meant to exist my home—

For I'thou the one who left dark Ireland'due south shore,

And Poland'south plain, and England'southward grassy lea,

And torn from Blackness Africa's strand I came

To build a "homeland of the free."

The costless?

Who said the free? Not me?

Surely not me? The millions on relief today?

The millions shot down when we strike?

The millions who have nothing for our pay?

For all the dreams we've dreamed

And all the songs nosotros've sung

And all the hopes we've held

And all the flags we've hung,

The millions who have nothing for our pay—

Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America exist America once again—

The land that never has been yet—

And nevertheless must exist—the land where every man is free.

The country that's mine—the poor human's, Indian's, Negro'due south,

ME—

Who made America,

Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and hurting,

Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,

Must bring dorsum our mighty dream over again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you cull—

The steel of freedom does not stain.

From those who live like leeches on the people'southward lives,

We must take dorsum our land once more,

America!

O, yeah, I say it manifestly,

America never was America to me,

And however I swear this adjuration—

America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,

The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,

We, the people, must redeem

The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.

The mountains and the endless plain—

All, all the stretch of these groovy dark-green states—

And make America again!

Line-Past-Line Assay of "Allow America Exist America Again"

This whole poem is a crying out, a passionate plea for America to re-establish the Dream. It is a kind of personal hymn, a lyrical speech, to freedom and equality. To enable that plea to be heard and felt, the speaker has to accept the reader through some dark times, through history, to explain just why that Dream needs to live over again.

Lines 1 - iv

Alternating rhyme, repetition and alliteration are all at play in this the first stanza, near a vocal lyric. It's a directly call for the erstwhile America to be brought back to life again, to be revived.

Note the mention of the pioneer, those beginning seekers of liberty who with tremendous will and effort established themselves a home, against all the odds.

Line 5

Almost equally an aside, simply highly pregnant, the single line in parentheses reveals that, for the speaker, America as an ideal just hasn't happened. For him, this romantic notion of the American Dream never has been. Why is that?

Lines 6 - 9

The second lyrical quatrain, with similar rhyme pattern, places stronger emphasis on the dream, the original vision people had for the USA, one of love and equality. At that place would exist no feudal system in identify, no dictatorships - everyone would be equal.

Annotation the contrast of the language used here. There is the dream and love of those who would be equal, confronting those who would connive, scheme and beat out.

Line 10

Some other line in parentheses, every bit if the speaker is quietly reasserting his inner vox - once more making the betoken that this America hasn't existed for him, implying that he is far from the Dream. He is dubious to say the least.

Lines xi - xiv

The 3rd quatrain, with alternating rhyme for familiarity, highlights the outer ideals - the dressing upwardly of Liberty only for bear witness, which is phoney patriotism. The capital Fifty reinforces the idea that this could be the Statue of Liberty, the famous icon, based on a goddess, who holds the Declaration of Independence in one hand and the torch in the other. Cleaved chains lie at her feet.

The plea continues, to make the dream possible, to make information technology manifest in opportunity and equality, for all. The suggestion that equality could be in the air people breathe, means that equality should be a natural given, function of the textile that keeps u.s. all alive, sharing the common air.

Lines 15 - 16

The rhyming couplet in parentheses once again repeats that, for the speaker personally, equality has been out of reach, peradventure merely has never existed. Same goes for freedom. (Homeland of the free - could be based on the Star-Spangled Banner lyrics 'state of the free.')

Further Assay

Lines 17 - 18

In italics for special reasons, these lines, two questions, represent a turning bespeak in the poem; they are a different aspect of the speaker's identity. These two questions look dorsum, questioning the speaker's negativity (in parentheses) and as well await forward.

The metaphor of the veil has biblical connections (in Corinthians) alluding to a darkening of reality, of not existence able to see the truth.

Lines nineteen - 24

The first of the sextets, six lines which express even so another attribute of the speaker, who at present speaks equally and for, one of the oppressed, in the first person, I am. All the same, this voice too expresses the collective, articulating a mass sentiment.

And note that all types of person are included: white, blackness, native American, the immigrant. All are field of study to the savage competition and the hierarchical systems imposed upon them.

Lines 25 - thirty

The second sextet focuses on the boyfriend, any young homo no matter, caught upwardly in the industrial chaos of profit for profit's sake, where greed is good and power is the ultimate goal. The ugly, unacceptable face up of capitalism encourages only selfishness at any expense.

Lines 31 - 38

Again, apply of the repeated phrase I am brings abode the message loud and articulate in this octet: the arrangement is cruellest to those who are poorest. From the farmer to the servant, from the country to the fine houses of the wealthy, for many the Dream means only hunger and poverty.

Workers become de-humanized, go mere numbers and are treated as if they are commodities or money.

Lines 39 - fifty

The longest stanza in the poem, 12 lines, concentrates on the history of those immigrants who dreamt of central freedoms in the first place. This is the cruel irony. Those fleeing poverty, war and oppression; those forced to get out their native lands, had this dream within, a dream of being truly free in a new land.

They travelled to America in the hope of realizing this dream. People from Former Europe, many from Africa, all set out for a new life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness (Thomas Jefferson).

More than Line By Line Assay

Line 51

A unmarried line, another potent question. The previous twelve lines (the previous 50 lines) all led to this acute betoken. A simple all the same searching ask.

Lines 52 - 61

The next ten lines explore this notion of the free. But the speaker seems perplexed - where did this crazy question originate? It's as if the speaker doesn't know himself whatsoever longer, or the reasons why the question of the gratuitous should arise. Just exactly who are the free?

There are millions with little or cipher. When labor is withdrawn and legitimate protest bundled, the authorities counteract with the bullet. Protest songs and banners and hope count for little - all that'south left is a barely animate dream.

Lines 62 - seventy

The speaker takes a deep breath and repeats the opening line, just with more emotional input.....O, let America be America again. This is a plea from the heart, this time more personal - ME - nevertheless taking in many different types of people.

In these ix lines the reader truly gets to know the speaker's intention and demand. Freedom for all. It's nearly a call to rise up and take back what belongs to the many and not the few.

Lines 71 - 75

No matter the abuse, the pursuit of freedom is pure and strong. Those who have exploited the poor and sucked out their lifeblood (note the simile - like leeches) need to offset thinking again about buying and rights to belongings.

Lines 76 - 79

A short quatrain, a kind of summing up of the speaker'south whole take on the American Dream. A directly proclamation - the Dream will manifest at some time. It has to.

Lines 80 - 86

The final septet concludes that, out of the old rotten, criminal system, the people volition renew and refresh and rebuild something wholesome and sustainable. In that location remains hope that the cherished platonic - America - can exist made expert again.

Literary Devices in Let America Be America Once more

Let America Be America Again is an 86 line poem separate into 17 stanzas, 3 of which are single lines, two of which are couplets. In addition, there are four quatrains, 2 sextets, 1 octet, a twelve liner, ten liner, ix liner, quintet, and a 7 liner.

The layout is quite unusual. On the page the poem looks more than like an extended song lyric, with quatrains followed by single lines and very short lines turning upwardly in mid-stanza.

Allow'due south take a closer look at the literary devices:

Rhyme Scheme

Rhymes tend to bring familiarity and aid reinforce pregnant. In poetry, there are elementary rhyme schemes and there are challenging ones. In this poem the rhyming pattern starts in a conventional manner but gradually becomes more complex.

For example, take a look at the first 6 stanzas:

• abab - (b) - cdcd - (b) - bebe - (bb)

This is relatively piece of cake to follow. There is an alternating pattern in the kickoff three quatrains, with the strong full vowel rhyme e dominant:

be/free/me/me/Liberty/gratuitous/me/free.

The full finish rhymes go out the reader in no doubt nigh i of the main themes of this verse form - liberty and me. A strong pairing ensures a memorable bond.

So, the first sixteen lines are straightforward enough. After this the rhyme scheme gradually loses its regular blueprint and becomes stretched.

• However farther downwardly the line then to speak, there are all the same loose echoes of the familiar alternating pattern established at the beginning of the poem.

Each of the larger stanzas contains some form of full rhyme, or total and slant rhyme:

soil/all with machine/mean and get/free with lea/gratis.

Slant rhyme tends to challenge the reader because it is about to total rhyme but isn't full rhyme to the ear, as in soil/all. It means things aren't clicking in full, they're a little scrap out of harmony.

Every bit the poem progresses, rhyme becomes more intermittent and tends to condense in certain stanzas, equally in stanza xiii, pay/today and stanza 14, pain/rain/again. The poet'due south aim with such concentrated rhyme is to brand the words stick in the reader'due south listen and memory.

Literary Device (two)

Anaphora

Repetition plays an important role in this poem and occurs throughout. When words and phrases are repeated this has a like effect to chanting, reinforcing significant and giving the feel of power and accumulation of free energy.

From the showtime stanza - Let America/Let it exist/Let it be - to the concluding - The land, the plants, the mines, the rivers - there are repeats. Some critics accept likened them to song lyrics, others to parts of a political speech, where ideas and images are congenital upwardly again and over again.

Alliteration

There are numerous examples of alliterative lines - when words with leading consonants are close together - which bring texture and interest to lines and a challenge to the reader.

In the first 4 stanzas:

pioneer on the plain/home where he himself/dream the dreamers dreamed/country be a state where Liberty/slavery'southward scars.

Enjambment

Enjambment, when a line continues without punctuation on into the side by side, keeping the menstruation of sense, occurs in several stanzas. Look out for the 'open' end lines which encourage the reader to not pause just go on straight into the next line.

For example:

Let it be the pioneer on the plain

Seeking a habitation where he himself is free.

and once again:

We, the people, must redeem

The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.

Metaphor

Tangled in that countless aboriginal chain

of turn a profit, ability, gain, of grab the land!

Personification

That even yet its mighty daring sing

in every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

Sources

www.poets.org

Norton Anthology,Norton, 2005

https://uwc.utexas.edu

100 Essential Modern Poems, Ivan Dee, Joseph Parisi, 2005

© 2017 Andrew Spacey

maxwelloune1991.blogspot.com

Source: https://owlcation.com/humanities/Analysis-of-Poem-Let-America-Be-America-Again-by-Langston-Hughes

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