The Poet in Vogue: Langston Hughes (Essay Example)

Langstons Hughes was a proud man. He was proud of his community in Harlem, proud of the  culture he had inherited, and most of all,  he was proud of his work, and the inspiration that those works gave to people of all creeds, races, and backgrounds. To successfully profile Langston Hughes, it is imperative that one  analyze  Hughes artistic and cultural influences, to look at the techniques he utilized in his poetry, and ultimately to investigate the opinions and conclusions that respetable reviewers had about Hughes' many influences in the 20th century and beyond (Waldron).

Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri in 1901, he spent his youth moving from place to place due to the divorce and separation of his parents, and for a time even spent time at sea abroad.  It was this pseudo nomadic lifestyle that Hughes led in his early years that allowed Hughes to find a goldmine of inspiration  from a myriad of different cultures including but not limited to: France, Africa, Cuba, Haiti and many different parts of Europe. These cultural sources allowed Hughes to see different styles of music that would serve to improve the tone and words he used in his poems ;Furthermore, it led to his start as a prominent writer of poems, screenplays, and other literary works(Waldron).  The absolute biggest influence in Langston Hughes life was the quasi- city of Harlem in New York city. The rich Hispanic and African American culture found in this part of New York, as well as the rise of the blues style of music and other jazz related genres  not only influenced Langston Hughes’s writing, which led to his role in the creation of Jazz poetry,  But Harlem itself was directly impacted by Hughes, especially one he became the figurehead for the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920’s. These existing wells of innovation made Langston Hughes a poet who was willing to write about his culture as well as show borderline smugness over his culture and the people he found in Harlem(Waldron).

As a writer, Langston Hughes cites three Poets as major influences for his writing, Walt Whitman, Carl Sandburg, and Paul Laurence Dunbar. The techniques Hughes uses often are  a Six- Line stanza pattern   to utilize an ABCB style of Rhyme Scheme (Waldron).  Hughes often focuses his poems on the theme of Identity, a great example of this being  “I too sing America”, where Hughes touches upon the stigma of the identity of being African-American and the marginalization that comes along with this identity. Another ongoing metaphor in Hughes’s writing are dreams, whether it be in “Harlem'' where Hughes writes about decay and rot to symbolize dreams that have been abandoned, or in “Dreams'' where Hughes uses a bird with broken wings to symbolize the fall of man should dreams be deferred (Sharma). Hughes also tends to use a lot of repetition to drive home messages and concepts in his poems, in Hughes ``Blue  Fantasy'' Hughes uses the word away to depict the longing a woman has for a lover that has abandoned her. Another example can be seen in Harlem, where Hughes utilizes the phrase “does it'' to escalate the severity of what a person’s broken dreams are. Ultimately Hughes uses all of these techniques to make his poems simple, rhythmic, and powerful, Hughes poems are all “Tinged with sadness” (Waldron) but show that an individual  can feel joy despite the racism and injustice one often encounters in life(Waldron),(Sharma).

The critical views that most people held on Langston Hughes’ were for the most part positive, The man was the head of the Harlem Renaissance, and he wasn’t even a Harlem native. Hughes was loved  by his community and seen as one of the greatest of his time during and after his life. However,  Like his poem “Mother to Son” alludes to, life is not always a crystal stairway, some of Hughes works, more specifically Fine clothes to the Jew (1927) were seen negatively because and I quote: “It’s title and it’s Frankness” ("Maple," Encyclopaedia Britannica Online). Apart from that instance, it was rare that anyone had an issue with Hughes’ works, seeing as the man was very popular with the people and his audience, some might even refer to him as Vogue in his prime, but that’s just an overly complicated way of stating how Hughes writing and pride in his work was well place, as they are admittedly some of the greatest pieces of literature in American history, and expertly captured the hardships and incredibly complex situations that African Americans faced during the 20th century (Blackford,The Virginia quarterly review.com). The poem “Harlem” by Langston Hughes expertly depicts the importance of not abandoning one’s dreams and aspirations despite the adversities issued by life; furthermore, Hughes borrows from notable poet  Paul Laurence Dunbar  to display a masterful shift from the ABCB Rhyme scheme into free-verse poetry to deliver a  message about not surrendering hopes and dreams  in only 11 Stanzas. 

Poem Analysis

Langston Hughes’s “Harlem” is a poem that depicts the effects that oppression and injustice has had on the dreams and aspirations of the people of Harlem and how leaving these dreams behind is akin to death.  The main message in Harlem states that one should not allow themselves to be a slave to discrimination and instead of abandoning one’s dreams they should fight back against system wide racism like the one in the 20th century. First, it is important to first understand the meaning behind the name, While the poem is named after the popular New York district, it is key to understand that the title in fact refers to the people of Harlem in the 1950’s. In analyzing this poem, a deeper understanding of Hughes' poetic techniques and tendencies, like his masterful  use of Six- Line stanza pattern  and an ABCB style of Rhyme Scheme.   

It is no coincidence that this poem was written for a community in New York that was almost entirely minorities during a period in History that in present time is remembered as the prelude to the full swing of the civil rights movement. This is notable when you consider that the poem “Harlem” which, as stated earlier, is really about the citizens in the Harlem neighborhood were almost exclusively  all minorities. This clearly depicts Hughes’s poem  with the intention to influence his audience, which in this case are all people who have been discriminated against and oppressed by their government. This background information on the oppression of the people of Harlem, as well as people of color at the time is vital to the theme and message of this poem, as it is the foundation of said poem, and every line can be directly tied to the overarching message  of  combating oppressions and following one’s dreams.   

The poem itself begins with a question: “What happens to a dream deferred” (Hughes) This sets up the entirety of the poem, as Hughes muses just what  a dream that has been abandoned can be likened to, and ultimately the poem ends with another question: “Or does it [A dream deferred] explode?” (Hughes) The poem utilizes a lot of similes that compare a forgotten dream to decay, and anger, Lines like "Does it{a dream deferred} stink like rotten meat?" (Hughes) this quote displays how according to Hughes, leaving behind your dreams is like leaving a part of yourself to die and decay, like rotten meat; furthermore, this use of similes marries itself to repetition in order  to pose comparisons continues throughout the first half, it is very much akin to a section of Paul Laurence Dunbar’s “The Debt”, where Dunbar, one of Hughes noted influences  uses repetition in a similar manner :” Gives me a true release —

Gives me the clasp of peace”(Dunbar). This quote, while irrelevant to the poem Harlem, does exhibit one of the inspirations for Hughes' use of literary devices in the Poem itself. All of this analysis regarding the theme of death is notable when you unite it with the aforementioned message of the poem. “Harlem” as a poem serves to influence the reader not by informing, but instead by warning the readers of the dangers that come with allowing oneself to give up on fighting oppression, which by extension is giving up on one’s dreams; furthermore, this aspect of the poem is depicted in all the quotes used earlier, they all use the idea of death and decay, and in the case of the ending, violent explosions, this all represents how Hughes sees the situation in America at the time, the only option is to proudly oppose racism and bigotry, to show those who would look down upon people of color that they too are just as creative and hard working as any other human being, or else face social and mental decay at the idea that people of color are merely second class citizens.

Ultimately, Langston Hughes’s “Harlem” was a bi-product of his influences as a writer, his style of writing, the techniques he used all serve to show the sheer joy that Hughes’s felt for African Americans like himself who were just trying to get by, in a time where oppression was seeped into every aspect of  African-American life, it is pretty easy to see how such a man would come and use music, art, and culture as an inspiration to start a movement of self expression and self worth affected the people it involved so much that soon after it ended the civil rights movement began. Langston Hughes truly summarized the idea of being in Vogue, which is to define an entire period of popularity in your culture.