Plasa, Carl. “Doing the Slave Trade in Different Voices: Poetics and Politics in Robert Hayden’s First “Middle Passage.” African American Review 45, no. 4 (Winter 2012): 557-573

Through the extensive dissection of Robert Hayden’s poem “The Middle Passage,” Carl Plasa argues that “The Middle Passage” was essential in addressing the segregationist structure of 1940s America. Although, according to Hayden, the main purpose of his work was to “contribute toward an understanding of what our past had really been like”(557). While it did just that, it had a more constructive effect on Americans in the 1940s. During a time of segregation, “The Middle Passage” reminded Americans of their past identity as oppressors. As Hayden recalls the hardships and cruelties upon the slave ships, his goal is to inspire a project of counter-violence. I specifically enjoyed the line, “Shuttles in the rocking loom of history, the dark ships move, the dark ships move” (567). This metaphor cleverly combines the slaves’ labor aboard the ships with the motion of the machines Northern American workers used to make profitable textiles. Through this ironic metaphor, I believe that Hayden is trying to tell Americans of the 1940s that most people wrongfully benefitted from slavery; it wasn’t just the south. He wants to remind Americans that no one was right when it came to slavery, and everyone should be accepting and sympathetic to all African Americans. Thus, Plasa provided me with an in depth look at the ongoing importance of the middle passage as it is used to inspire the end of segregation years after it’s end; this provided me with a brand-new perspective of the slave trade.