Maya Angelou wrote Still I Rise in 1978, In which a lot of racism was going on at this time towards African Americans in the late 70’s but early 80’s. Angelou lived through some of the worst oppression and inequality for African American people while growing up. Angelou saw its effects on society and the African American people. This poem is her declaration that she, for one, would not allow the hatefulness of society to determine her own success. The poem, Still I Rise, is not only a proclamation of her own determination to rise above society, but was also a call to others to live above the society in which they were brought up.
Scholars believed that Angelou saw life very simple through “her acute sensitivity to the sound of the life around her… its rhythms, its idioms, its idiosyncratic vocabulary, and especially its process of image making” (Weixlmann). For Angelou to see life so simple and take her work of Still I Rise in of account of simplicity when making poetry, but also deep down the poem has a deeper meaning for oppression of African Americans. Angelou does this by the narrator in her works which help tell the reader “what we want to hear” (Weixlmann). In doing this Angelou pulls the focus to ability to survive, indeed prosper, by tale telling or giving the reader what they want to hear. This technique of storytelling helps make it simple for the place of her stand in oppression of African American, but it is deep enough in the work to show the world the problems African Americans face.
“You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.”
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The first stanza of Still I Rise Angelou declares that no one can keep her from prevailing in life, and that she will not feel oppress by another race. “You may trod me in the very dirt” she is simply saying that even though you bury me in this dirt, she will rise from it like “dust” as she explains in the last line of stanza one.
Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
’Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Stanza two explains her dominance as a black woman in America, and she already proven that she has overcome the oppression by becoming successful for all the right reasons. She uses “sassiness” as a way to tease back that she has made it as a African American, and will continue because “oil well pumping in her living room.” This referring the black as gold, because oil is very important to the needs of life and oil nickname is black-gold.
Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.
Stanza three also refers to this feeling of oppression that Angelou is feeling that tries to keep her down. Angelou personifies the moon and sun like they are people in which they both move bodies of water (Oceans). She believes in is very natural to rise out against oppression and stand for what is right. Angelou nature aspect comes close because she tells the reader that no matter what she rises.
Stanza four and five is Angelou questioning society on many reason about herself and what they are doing to her that cannot stop her from Rising over them to be someone. It comes that in thss story of a poem she is questioning society and the reader either answers or wonders what the answer truly is. Quickly after stanza four and five, stanza six comes to answers these question presented by Angelou towards society and their hateful selves.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.
Here in stanza six you see that you can “shoot” her “cut” her or even kill her with hatefulness she wil; still rise. It isn’t for society to try to give up on keeping her down, because no matter what you do to her she will come out of top. As she says: “But still, like air, I’ll rise.” This statement is probably the most powerful in the poem because air rises every day, and she plans to rise against something every day until her last breath.
Angelou in her final stanza pull out what the reader final wants to hear. So simple but deep with meaning and very impactful for thus society she questioned and showboats on.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
Angelou sets the stage with the other stanzas and performs the last scene with this final stanza. In her final words of Still I Rise, Angelou will leave the “terror and fear” behind meaning she will leave what society has put her through of oppression, during a new day or start of a new day she will rise on such an opportunity to make a difference against oppression. She is gifted of writing from her ancestors as well has the “dream and hope of a slave” to rise and become something a slave couldn’t do. Which is become successful as a African American in this racial society.
References
- Maya Angelou Official Website
- Poetry Foundation – Still I Rise
- Biography.com – Maya Angelou
- Maya Angelou reciting Still I Rise on YouTube
- Harvard Magazine – Maya Angelou’s work
- The Paris Review – Interview with Maya Angelou
- Britannica – Maya Angelou
- Oprah Interviews Maya Angelou’s Literary Agent (Video)
