...I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is the 1969 autobiography about the early years of African-American writer and poet Maya Angelou. The first in a seven-volume series, it is a coming-of-age story that illustrates how strength of character and a love of literature can help overcome racism and trauma. The book begins when three-year-old Maya and her older brother are sent to Stamps, Arkansas, to live with their grandmother and ends when Maya becomes a mother at the age of 16. In the course of Caged Bird, Maya transforms from a victim of racism with an inferiority complex into a self-possessed, dignified young woman capable of responding to prejudice. Angelou was challenged by her friend, author James Baldwin, and her editor, Robert Loomis, to write an autobiography that was also a piece of literature. Reviewers often categorize Caged Bird as autobiographical fiction because Angelou uses thematic development and other techniques common to fiction, but the prevailing critical view characterizes it as an autobiography, a genre she attempts to critique, change, and expand. The book covers topics common to autobiographies written by Black American women in the years following the civil rights movement: a celebration of Black motherhood; a critique of racism; the importance of family; and the quest for independence, personal dignity, and self-definition. Angelou uses her autobiography to explore subjects such as identity, rape, racism, and literacy. She also writes in new ways about...
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...Sewit Asfaha Hum 300 11/06/2011 Maya Angelou •Born: 4 April 1928 •Birthplace: St. Louis, Missouri •Best Known As: Author of I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings Name at birth: Marguerite Johnson Maya Angelou's 1969 autobiography, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, was nominated for a National Book Award and made her a symbol of pluck and pride for African-American women. In the 1950s Angelou had been a dancer and stage actress, and she was active in the civil rights movement (she became a coordinator for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, thanks to a request from Martin Luther King, Jr.). During the 1960s she spent five years in Africa, working as a journalist and a teacher. Angelou returned to the United States and in 1969 published I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings. In 1972 she was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for her collection of poetry, Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie. Since then, Angelou has continued teaching, writing, acting, producing, recording (she won Grammy Awards for the spoken word for the years 1993, 1995 and 2002) and collecting honorary degrees from across the United States. Since 1981 she has been the Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University in North Carolina. At Bill Clinton's request, Angelou wrote a poem -- On the Pulse of Morning -- for his 1993 inauguration as U.S. president. I chose one of Maya Angelou (Phenomenal Woman) for two reasons. One I feel that Maya is still one of the best poets...
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...Who is Marguerite Annie Johnson? She is better known as Maya Angelou. Some know her as a poet, a lecturer, a civil rights activist, an author, and an orator. In her turbulent beginnings, she struggled to discover her confidence, dignity, and self worth as an African American. She grew up in an unstable environment. Ms. Angelou was primarily raised by her paternal grandmother. Although she lived briefly with her father, Bailey Johnson, and periods with her mother, Vivian Baxter-Johnson, ‘she accredits her grandmother with planting the seeds of pride and her religiousness.’ (Angelou, 1969) Emotionally, Marguerite Johnson was a sensitive child. Her feelings were easily hurt. She also felt racial discrimination from being in the South. She didn't have much confidence, and she believed (whole-heartedly) in GOD. She did not have enough love from her caregivers, as a child. At eight years old, she was raped. That event caused her to remain silent for five years; following the murder of her accused rapist. His death caused her to believe that her speaking her accusers' name caused his death. Marguerite Johnson was befriended by the kindness and generosity of a family friend, and the discovery of authors and poets helped her regain her voice. The adults in Maya Angelou's life were unstable, to say the least. Her father (being tall and handsome), was a womanizer. Her mother (being a beautiful woman), had have any man she wanted; considering she had several male acquaintances...
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...Name of Institution Analysis of Two Poems by Maya Angelou Name of Student Course Name and Number Name of Professor Paper Due Date In Maya Angelou’s poem “They Went Home”, the persona has her reference on married men whom think of her as a friend and nothing more. Not a woman to them but a girl (Zefferino). However, they have a high perception of her personality but don’t have feelings for her like she does for them. “I had an air of mystery”. The men referenced had the persona think that the relationship that they had could turn out to be more than it seemed to be. They think of her as kind, clean and humorous. Despite this they don’t want to be in a relationship with her. The men that the poet references in the poem liked the persona because of her physical attributes and wanted to get involved with her physically, sexually. They wanted a physical relationship (Zefferino). “They liked my smile, my wit, my hips”. The attributes in this line specify in order the number of men that the persona desired, three men. The imagery keys the picture of a woman that receives the kind of love that she thinks she ought to be given. The persona is insecure and has a low self-pride because of the rejection that she faces. Men want to lay with her but do not want to stay with her because they all return to their wives. The last sentence of the first two stanzas, shows that the persona is willing and expecting to be used sexually by men that she...
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...Sarah Liette Coach 6-8-2015 Maya Angelou “Graduation” Summary Graduation Graduation is an important transition time in every person’s life. It is about moving on to something better and more important and to use your knowledge to achieve life goals. This is what the children attending the grammar school believed as well, including Maya Angelou. Given from her point of view, the story Graduation has ethos because as an African American girl, she shared the same thoughts and feelings as everyone standing on the stage or in the auditorium when Mr. Edward Donleavy passively demeaned everything the students had worked so hard to achieve. This story is told by a women who had surpassed all of the difficulties in life to get to this day, and through her learned, and personal, figurative, and detailed writing, has been able to pass on both the ill feelings and the warm feelings of that experience from Mr. Donleavy’s speech, to that of Henry Reed. What Angelou does best is evoke feelings and empathy from her readers. By relating to them and broadcasting her emotions for everyone to see, she emphasizes her sense of being wronged. When she is describing the excitement and anxiety in the people around her, she is relating to what everyone feels when they are about to graduate. “The children in Stamps trembled visibly with anticipation...the whole young population had come down with graduation epidemic.” (22). This is the opening of the story. Immediately what does...
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...Sabrina Barcena English 68 MW 6:45-8:50 Professor: Danielle Cofer Results May Vary My father said to me once, “it’s the things you have to deal with now that make you the kind of person you later in life”. In “I know why the caged bird sings” by Maya Angelou; Maya writes a lot about things she had to overcome as a child. Maya went through the trauma of displacement, racism, and being raped; especially at a young age and I believe a lot of what she had to deal with and how she reacted made her the respected woman she is today. Maya was only four years old when she was shipped off and ditched by her parents to live with their grandma in the South. At such a young age she already knows the feeling of abandonment from this. When she and Bailey arrive in Stamps, the note posted on their bodies is not addressed to Annie Henderson whom we later find out is “Momma” to them, but rather “To Whom It May Concern.” Maya starts to have trouble believing that she belongs anywhere. But who wouldn’t moving from place to place. “If growing up is painful for the southern black girl, being aware of her displacement is the rust on the razor that threatens the throat. It is an unnecessary insult.” This from the prologue and probably from an adult mind of Maya or maybe a little bit older than her age when her separation actually happed. It’s so sad because all she really knows is her brother bailey who is just a year older than her. He’s the only thing that really stayed constant in her...
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...Spotlight on one special bird in the cage While researching the lists of the authors, I was attracted to the author Maya Angelou, because I am personally interested in civil rights. In this essay, I am going to research whole biography about her which includes lots of work that she has completed, her general perspective and important event which affected people in that century. The reason why I chose her is to explore whether she should have been much popular or not. First I will find historical background of her so that every audience can know at least who she is. And then I will find her major works that she has done, popularity of work at that time, popularity of herself and hidden work which has potential to be popular at that time so...
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...Phenomenally Me, Maya Angelou was one the greatest poets of all times, she was wise and unique. Maya Angelou was a public figure, which she was awarded Honorary Doctorates by more than fifty major universities and colleges around the world. One of Maya Angelou principal message was one of inclusiveness; that despite our ethnic, religious and cultural differences, we are more alike than unalike. During the celebration of the great Maya Angelou birthday, her daughter said: “she saw all our differences in language, orientation and perspective as an indication of the richness of our imagination and creativity, and as elements of our nature that we should celebrate “. The year of 1981 Ms. Angelou was nominated for several important awards and read...
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..."I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" is the chronicle of Maya Angelou's youthful exodus from victim to victor. In simple terms, Maya Angelou was an African-American woman, brown like me, who found her voice not only in words but in truth. She eloquently, brilliantly, and with high sensitivity expressed the harsh reality of her life experiences yet infused her readers with power, strength, realization, and infinite hope. It is truth that Dr. Maya Angelou helped save my young life... I was again fortunate to become acquainted with her family. When I encountered - or rather rushed to meet - Dr. Angelou alone at the elevator of the lobby where she'd just spoken at an HRC event, I stumbled over my words. Maya Angelou was truly a sight to behold... Luxuriously tall, and big, and broad... and that voice! That powerful radiantly soft and strong voice... I got to hear that voice again....
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...Maya Angelou was an inspiration to all the oppressed, the downtrodden, the bullied, and the weak. She imparted a beacon of hope for people of all races and ethnicities. Angelou’s life has informed us about the human condition she faced and showing how she overcame it to pass on to the generations to come. Her life has taught the world important messages regarding love, death, suffering, and aspirations. Angelou wasn’t always brave and defiant. Her words were once tongue-tied, grasping for a way to be heard. In her first book, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Angelou wrote an excerpt about her time with Mrs. Flowers. Mrs. Flowers had a jaunty personality and a great smile. Angelou even refers to her as “the lady who threw me my first lifeline”(Angelou)....
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...“She doesn’t talk much. Her name’s Margaret.” […] “Well, that may be, but the name’s too long. I’d never bother myself. I’d call her Mary if I was you.” This is a scene where we see Maya’s core identity, her name, being wiped out and tempered with. Throughout ‘I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings’, we realize the protagonist, Maya, faces several identity crisis in her life and is thus left to write a biography of the culmination of incidents that have occurred throughout her life and hence that have shaped her identity today. Those around her mold Maya’s identity. Her relationships are what define her. There are no two ways about it; Maya’s rape calls her identity into question. Suddenly, she is portrayed as both a woman and child but she feels like neither. Thus, she is left with spending the rest of the book trying on different identities...
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...In the poem “Mother to Son” by Langston Hughes and in the novel I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou, the mothers are both showing their children how to live a successful and to preserve in the hard time in life you may go through. The mom states in the poem , “So boy don't you turn back. / Don't you set down on the steps.” (10-11) This is one of the lines in the poem from the mother talking to the son. She doesn't want the son to give up. He shouldn't turn back just because he hit rock bottom. The son should always persevere in the tough times. According to the mother in the poem “Don't you fall now- / For I’se still goin’, honey, / I’se still climbin’ (13-14). in other words, this mother doesn't want her son to give up. She is still climbing through the struggle....
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...Throughout Maya Angelou’s poem, “On the Pulse of Morning”, strings of words weave together to form the intrinsic tapestry of America’s plight-ridden history during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. To begin with, the lines of Angelou’s third stanza, “Your mouths spilling words, Armed for slaughter,”* alludes to the tantalizing history of ceaseless wars, of both words and weapons, suffered by the American People which consumed these epochs in the raging and chaotic flames of the Vietnam and Cold Wars, as well as, The War on Terror. Moreover, the words, “There is a true yearning to respond to The singing River and the wise Rock. So say the Asian, the Hispanic, the Jew, The African, the Native American, the Sioux,”* resound the cry for...
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...Maya Angelou is an African American woman who has gone through many racial prejudices and experiences. She often ponders on these experiences and uses them to illustrate messages in her various works of literature. Angelou has a very unique writing style. Angelou uses many literary devices like figurative language in her stories. To understand Angelou on a more personal level, it is important that one learns a little bit about her life and herself as well. Maya Angelou was born on April 4, 1928 in St. Louis, Missouri and was formerly known as Marguerite Annie Johnson. Angelou had a difficult childhood. Her parents divorced when she was young. She also moved to Arkansas, where she faced a lot of unjust issues. At, the age of seven, she was raped by her mother’s boyfriend. Out of anger, Angelou’s uncle killed the boyfriend. Witnessing this left Angelou scarred and became a virtual mute. Angelou’s early years were also spent being a talented author, actress, dancer, and poet. Angelou was able to obtain parts in several plays including “Porgy and Bess” and “Calypso Heat Wave”. Angelou had a very unique, yet harsh culture. Throughout her life, Angelou was often faced with discriminated against. She grew up in the south, so this kind of thing was very common. Angelou was African American, and so was her family. She’s been through many experiences involving African American culture. Most of what Angelou has been through is what has heavily inspired her. Growing up around black people...
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...Essay Dr Maya Angelou is a celebrated poet, and successful novelist, dramatist, producer, actress, historian, and civil rights activist. She was born on April 4th, 1928 in St Louis. When she was 14, she dropped out of school to be the frist african- american cable car conductor. She also finished school giving birth to her son Guy, just a few weeks after graduation. In the poem 'Still I Rise' Maya talks about black people fighting for justice against racist people. She tells the victims of racism to be confident, fight for their freedom, and don't let them put you down. In Stanza 1, Maya's message to the bullies and racists that they can make her feel like dirt, as if she's not normal, but still like dust, she'll rise. "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." The expression "You may write me down in history" suggests that the poet adresses the bully, and the message is, i'm not afraid of the bullies, and i'm not afraid to stand up to them. The expression "You may trod me in the very dirt" implies that, the bullies can make the victims feel like dirt and unwanted, "But still like dust, i'll rise" is a similie and indicates, these bullies can shout horrible and nasty things, but they'll never be enough to knock their victim down. In this stanza, The poet adresses the bullies and racist and her message to them is, All you bullies can say whatever they want, they could scream...
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