Let America Be America Again by Langston Hughes 1935

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

Langston Hughes

Langston Hughes And A Summary of "Let America Be America Again"

"Let America Be America Again" focuses on the thought 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 platonic America has gone, or never was, but could yet be.

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

Whilst pessimistic and hard hitting, the poem does take an optimistic ending and lights the manner forward with hope.

Langston Hughes was going through a difficult 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 volume publication, almost notably The Weary Blues.

It was on a train journey through Depression-struck America in 1935 that inspired him to pen this archetype 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 effigy in the world of blackness literature, following his earlier work in the so-called Harlem Renaissance, an upbeat blackness artistic movement peaking in the 1920s.

"Let America Be America Once again" reflects the many influences in Hughes'southward poetry - from the expansive work of Whitman to street language, from jazz rhythm to the steady iambic lines of earlier black poets such equally Paul Laurence Dunbar.

Let America Be America Over again

Let America be America again.

Permit it be the dream it used to be.

Let information technology exist the pioneer on the evidently

Seeking a dwelling where he himself is free.

Roll to Go on

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(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—

Let it exist that great potent state of honey

Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme

That whatever homo exist crushed by i in a higher place.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land exist a state where Liberty

Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,

But opportunity is existent, and life is free,

Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,

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

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?

And who are you lot that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed autonomously,

I am the Negro begetting slavery'south scars.

I am the carmine human being driven from the land,

I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—

And finding only the same old stupid plan

Of dog eat domestic dog, of mighty vanquish the weak.

I am the young homo, full of force and hope,

Tangled in that ancient endless chain

Of profit, ability, gain, of catch the state!

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

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

Of owning everything for one'south own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.

I am the worker sold to the machine.

I am the Negro, retainer to you all.

I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—

Hungry notwithstanding today despite the dream.

Beaten all the same today—O, Pioneers!

I am the man who never got ahead,

The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'k the one who dreamt our basic dream

In the Old Earth while however a serf of kings,

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

That even yet its mighty daring sings

In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

That'south fabricated America the land information technology has become.

O, I'm the homo who sailed those early on seas

In search of what I meant to exist my dwelling house—

For I'1000 the one who left nighttime Ireland's shore,

And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,

And torn from Black Africa's strand I came

To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?

Surely not me? The millions on relief today?

The millions shot downwardly when we strike?

The millions who accept 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'southward almost dead today.

O, permit America exist America again—

The land that never has been yet—

And yet must be—the land where every man is gratuitous.

The land that's mine—the poor man's, Indian's, Negro'southward,

ME—

Who made America,

Whose sweat and blood, whose religion and pain,

Whose hand at the foundry, whose plough in the pelting,

Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Certain, call me any ugly name you choose—

The steel of freedom does non stain.

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

We must take back our country again,

America!

O, yes, I say it manifestly,

America never was America to me,

And even so I swear this oath—

America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,

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

Nosotros, the people, must redeem

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

The mountains and the endless plain—

All, all the stretch of these great green states—

And make America once again!

Line-Past-Line Analysis of "Let America Be America Again"

This whole verse form 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 take the reader through some dark times, through history, to explain just why that Dream needs to alive again.

Lines 1 - 4

Alternating rhyme, repetition and alliteration are all at play in this the first stanza, virtually a song lyric. It'south a direct call for the old America to exist brought dorsum to life again, to exist revived.

Notation the mention of the pioneer, those showtime seekers of freedom who with tremendous will and effort established themselves a home, against all the odds.

Line 5

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

Lines half dozen - 9

The second lyrical quatrain, with similar rhyme pattern, places stronger emphasis on the dream, the original vision people had for the U.s., i of beloved and equality. There would be no feudal arrangement in identify, no dictatorships - everyone would be equal.

Note the contrast of the language used hither. In that location is the dream and love of those who would be equal, against those who would connive, scheme and crush.

Line 10

Some other line in parentheses, as if the speaker is quietly reasserting his inner voice - again 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 11 - fourteen

The tertiary quatrain, with alternating rhyme for familiarity, highlights the outer ideals - the dressing upwardly of Liberty merely for show, which is phoney patriotism. The uppercase L 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 i paw and the torch in the other. Broken bondage lie at her feet.

The plea continues, to make the dream possible, to make it manifest in opportunity and equality, for all. The suggestion that equality could be in the air people breathe, means that equality should exist a natural given, office of the material that keeps us all alive, sharing the mutual air.

Lines 15 - 16

The rhyming couplet in parentheses again repeats that, for the speaker personally, equality has been out of achieve, peradventure only has never existed. Aforementioned goes for freedom. (Homeland of the complimentary - could exist based on the Star-Spangled Banner lyrics 'land of the free.')

Further Analysis

Lines 17 - xviii

In italics for special reasons, these lines, two questions, represent a turning point in the poem; they are a different aspect of the speaker'due south identity. These two questions look dorsum, questioning the speaker'southward negativity (in parentheses) and also look forwards.

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

Lines nineteen - 24

The first of the sextets, vi lines which express yet some other aspect of the speaker, who now speaks every bit and for, one of the oppressed, in the first person, I am. All the same, this voice also expresses the collective, articulating a mass sentiment.

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

Lines 25 - xxx

The 2d sextet focuses on the young man, whatsoever young man no affair, defenseless up in the industrial chaos of profit for profit'due south sake, where greed is good and power is the ultimate goal. The ugly, unacceptable confront of commercialism encourages but selfishness at any expense.

Lines 31 - 38

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

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

Lines 39 - 50

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

They travelled to America in the promise 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 single line, some other strong question. The previous twelve lines (the previous 50 lines) all led to this astute point. A simple yet searching ask.

Lines 52 - 61

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

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

Lines 62 - 70

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

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

Lines 71 - 75

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

Lines 76 - 79

A brusk quatrain, a kind of summing up of the speaker's whole take on the American Dream. A direct declaration - the Dream will manifest at some time. It has to.

Lines fourscore - 86

The final septet concludes that, out of the quondam rotten, criminal system, the people will renew and refresh and rebuild something wholesome and sustainable. There remains hope that the cherished ideal - America - can be made good again.

Literary Devices in Let America Be America Again

Let America Exist America Over again is an 86 line poem split into 17 stanzas, three of which are single lines, two of which are couplets. In improver, there are 4 quatrains, 2 sextets, 1 octet, a twelve liner, x liner, ix liner, quintet, and a seven liner.

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

Let's take a closer expect at the literary devices:

Rhyme Scheme

Rhymes tend to bring familiarity and assistance reinforce significant. In poetry, there are simple rhyme schemes and there are challenging ones. In this poem the rhyming pattern starts in a conventional style but gradually becomes more complex.

For instance, take a expect at the showtime 6 stanzas:

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

This is relatively easy to follow. At that place is an alternating blueprint in the first 3 quatrains, with the strong full vowel rhyme e dominant:

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

The full terminate rhymes exit the reader in no dubiousness about one of the primary themes of this verse form - freedom and me. A strong pairing ensures a memorable bail.

So, the starting time 16 lines are straightforward enough. After this the rhyme scheme gradually loses its regular blueprint and becomes stretched.

• Still farther downwardly the line then to speak, there are still loose echoes of the familiar alternating design established at the kickoff of the poem.

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

soil/all with machine/mean and become/free with lea/free.

Camber rhyme tends to claiming the reader considering it is near to full rhyme but isn't total rhyme to the ear, equally in soil/all. Information technology means things aren't clicking in full, they're a piddling bit out of harmony.

As the verse form progresses, rhyme becomes more intermittent and tends to condense in certain stanzas, every bit in stanza 13, pay/today and stanza fourteen, pain/rain/again. The poet's aim with such full-bodied rhyme is to make the words stick in the reader's mind and memory.

Literary Device (2)

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 meaning and giving the feel of ability and accumulation of energy.

From the first stanza - Let America/Permit information technology be/Allow it exist - to the final - The state, the plants, the mines, the rivers - in that location are repeats. Some critics take likened them to song lyrics, others to parts of a political speech, where ideas and images are built up over again and 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 claiming to the reader.

In the starting time four stanzas:

pioneer on the plain/habitation where he himself/dream the dreamers dreamed/country be a land where Liberty/slavery's scars.

Enjambment

Enjambment, when a line continues without punctuation on into the next, keeping the flow of sense, occurs in several stanzas. Expect out for the 'open' terminate lines which encourage the reader to not interruption just continue straight into the next line.

For example:

Let it exist the pioneer on the apparently

Seeking a dwelling where he himself is free.

and again:

We, the people, must redeem

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

Metaphor

Tangled in that endless ancient chain

of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!

Personification

That even nevertheless its mighty daring sing

in every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

Sources

world wide web.poets.org

Norton Anthology,Norton, 2005

https://uwc.utexas.edu

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

© 2017 Andrew Spacey

tetreaultchising.blogspot.com

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

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