The Memoirs of Underrepresented Groups

For class today, we had to read "The White House" by Claude McKay, which details the speaker's rage at the treatment of Black people in the United States. McKay leads the reader through the battle the speaker endures to contain themselves and emotionally rise above the racism they face on a daily basis. This piece connects well to A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry, which we read and analyzed earlier in the semester. In that play, Walter Lee Younger is shown as desperate, seeking a way to elevate his status both financially and socially. He longs to follow his dreams, but is constricted by the society in which he lives: America. He may have once been composed; in fact, his mother claims he was, but his economic status has driven him to anger by the play's onset, resulting in a tirade of negative emotions. He is resentful and pained, obviously past the point of controlled calm that is depicted in "The White House." 


The Younger family in A Raisin in the Sun

However, despite Walter Lee's desperate anger, he never rises to violence (apart from gripping the collar of a business partner), following along with the narrative provided in "The White House." This pacifist stance was one taken on by many in the Civil Rights Movement, with Martin Luther King Jr. encouraging peaceful protest. 

In Hansberry's play, one segment in particular truly connects to McKay's poem for me, which is when the Younger family purchases and plans to move into a home located in a white neighborhood. The reaction they receive is incredibly negative, with the community attempting to force them out before they had even officially moved in. One line in "The White House" connects to this narrative well: "A chafing savage, down the decent street" (7). The Youngers were immediately seen as lesser-than, eliciting fright in white people simply at the idea of their presence in the neighborhood. They even send Lindner, a representative of the Clybourne Park Improvement Association, in an attempt to convince them to not move. Such negativity would repel anyone, but the Youngers persisted, moving into the community regardless of the racism against them. They resist "the potent poison of [their] hate" (14), allowing their more positive feelings to prevail. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Two Walt Whitmans

Image
I feel a particular dichotomy when it comes to Walt Whitman. I, admittedly, am not terribly well-read when it comes to this author, but from what I have, my opinions on the works have contrasted dramatically.  For our class, we read "I Celebrate Myself, and Sing Myself," which reeked of privilege and ignorance. His opening stanza, for example, sings of equality, and while he may see that as the ideal, the concept rings false in reality. To assume it undermines the past and continued struggles of minorities to thrive in a racially biased society. Seeing as he is writing about America and prideful patriotism, this has even more prevalence, for our country's entire history is stained with racism. He also claims that his entire being was formed from the soil of the land, which is simply not true, as somewhere along his family tree, ancestors migrated over from another land. The only people who can fully stake their roots in the United States are Native Americans, which he was
Read more

The Final Post

Image
Well, everyone, I suppose this is it. The very last blog post. Unlike in  The Final Problem , by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (whose works I've themed my titles on), I'm not meeting a watery "doom" vanquishing my arch-nemesis. I have, however, battled a few enemies this semester, conquering them— in my own way, of course.  Presenting in front of people has always been a fear of mine, and it used to be far worse in high school. I would seize in front of a class, legs shaking, hands and voice trembling, as I detailed whatever it was I needed to convey. It was a nightmare. I've made vast improvements since then, and depending on the situation, I may not feel very anxious at all. The Lumen events and the presentation in this class both helped to bring me a little further out of my shell. I'm also normally quite shy in class discussions, which I'm pleased to say was not the case in our English course. I may not have been making accurate points all of the time, but I
Read more

The Return of William Carlos Williams

Image
Straight out the gate: I am not fond of this man's poetry. If you're not prepared for some slight Williams bashing, I would find another post to indulge yourself in.  Most of them are pleasant, I promise! Note: Dr. Reed, since you're forced to read this for grading purposes, I apologize if you really enjoy his work. Anyhow, I was first officially introduced to this particular poet in my Introduction to Creative Writing course, where Dr. Brown was teaching us about free verse poetry. He was a part of the imagist movement— alongside Ezra Pound and H.D. Williams— which involved several principles.  There is meant to be a direct treatment of the "thing" being written about Use a minimal amount of words to convey meaning (be concise!) Lay out the poem musically in terms of rhythm; don't subscribe to the metronome With these principles in mind, I'd let to make a quick correction. In class one day, I was discussing Williams and connecting him to the term "Co
Read more