Langston Hughes was a poet and a playwright, born in Joplin, Missouri, but was most known for being one of the most important writers and thinkers of the Harlem Renaissance, which was the African American movement in the 1920s that celebrated black life and their unique culture. Hughes’s creativeness was influenced by his own life Langston was born on February 1, 1902, then later in his life he published his first poem in 1921 titled “Montage of a Dream Deferred”. African-American themes made him a primary contributor to the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. He attended Columbia University in the city of New York but he left after one year to travel around the world while traveling around the world his poem soon got promoted by Vachel Lindsay shortly after in 1926 he published his first book named “The negro speaks of rivers”.
Langston was an award wining poet he won serval awards for many of his various poems. The impact in each tone, symbolistic awareness, and powerful point of view for each poem he has written making him so well-known and connecting to others. The Deeper meaning in his poems “I, Too” and “You and your Whole race” causing awareness on discrimination and a need of change in society that was needed back when he wrote them and currently. In “I, Too” and “You and Your Whole Race”, there contains constant similar tones in both poems- emphasizing seriousness, desperation, and a slight somber tone. The serious tone in both poem’s being apparent and strictly in order so it does not take away from the main point that is having a longing in truly becoming free.
If there were to be a shift that went to an additional funny, sarcastic, or a conflicting tone overall, the important aspect would decrease what the point in what the writing is meant to do. It is and meant to be eye opening in a more affecting way for others who cannot understand, don’t want to understand, and or increase the motivation for change and support from those who do share the similar suffering. The consistent serious tone is necessary so that nothing takes away from the awareness that is informed throughout the poem and builds that inclusive connection with it ultimately being wrong to exclude others based on physiques.
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The supporting tones that are desperation and a slight somber effect being used to help the reader relate or get the emotion behind what is being experienced when negativity is surrounded shame. ‘I, Too” is written from the point of view of an African American slave or domestic servant simply reflecting on the feelings of African Americans in American during that time period. The speaker begins by stating that he can too “sing America,” meaning he is claiming his right to feel patriotic towards his country, even though he is the “darker” brother who cannot sit at the table with everyone else but must eat in the kitchen.
This creates a picture of the racial segregation during the early 20th century, a time when African Americans had to face discrimination in every aspect of their daily lives. They were forced to eat, sleep, work, and live separately from their white counterparts, had very few civil or legal rights, and were verbally and physically racially victimized on a daily basis. However, the speaker does not wallow in despair. He believes that “tomorrow” he will join the others at the table and no one will even think to send him back to the kitchen.
Not only that but the “others” will see “how beautiful” the speaker is and feel ashamed for how bad they’ve treated him. This statement shows how hopeful and optimistic the speaker is for the future. The last line of the poem is altered to show the transformation that has occurred. “I, too, am America.” “You and your Whole Race” is an insightful poem about slavery, race, and poverty. Throughout the poem, Langston expresses the wrong doings in the lives of black people in the time of their enslavement.
As he says in the lines, “Look down upon the town in which you live/and be ashamed,” it was indeed a shame for black people at the time because of their condition and impoverish lifestyle. Hughes expresses the opinion that at that time black people should be ashamed of their poverty; of the white people and also the town in which they lived in. I believe he meant that black people should be conscious of their situation and aware of the factors contributing to it. Slavery weren’t only the oppression of one race by another but an element that created ignorance among both the black and the white race.
While one race believed they were superior the other saw themselves as inferior and this ideology was passed down to children being born and raised in those atrocious circumstances. According to Hughes some black people seemed to settle with the idea that they are inferior all because of ignorance that made them believe they should be treated unequally. At that time Black people were indeed incapable of fighting for their freedom. However according to Langston Hughes, when they are able to realize and fight for their right, they can claim their freedom without any doubt.
