Langston Hughes is renowned as a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance, marked by the flowering of black literary, intellectual and artistic expression. Through his poetic work, the writer sought to provide an honest portrayal of hardships and the joys that members of the black working class experienced in racialized America. A comparison of two of his notable poems “I Too” and “Theme for English B” captured the African American experience in a racialized society and optimism in the unity of the American identity. This paper aims to compare these two poems showing their similarities.
In terms of structure, the poem is similar as they are written in the first person and address American society. A look at Hughes’s “I Too” poem shows that it is written from a first-person perspective where the persona, a black man from the American society, is speaking and addressing his struggles of segregation from the members of the other races. He states, “I am the darker brother. They send me to eat in the kitchen when company comes” (Hughes 2-4). Through this persona, Hughes addresses the nature of things in his time and the social realities where members of the African American communities, particularly in the South, were segregated. Kennedy and Gioia further indicate that the speaker’s identity (the darker brother) is symbolic of the poem as it helps to identify and illustrate the realities of African Americans. There is a similarity between the persona in this poem and the one in “Theme for English B”, who is also a black man that lives in a racialized society and has to deal with similar struggles. In this case, he is the only black boy in his class and has to write an assignment on his personalized experience. In his expression he states; “I guess being coloured doesn’t make me not like the same things other folks like who are other races” (Hughes 23-24). Although his community is racialized and segregated, he seeks to show that there are not so different from the other races, although their experiences differ, since they enjoy the same things.
Another element of comparison between the two poems is the theme of racial inequality and the unity that all have as members of American society. In ‘I, Too’ Hughes shows that even though he is discriminated against as the ‘darker brother’ and asked to eat in the kitchen away from the rest, his time is coming when he will be able to sit at the table and eat with his brothers since; “I, too, am America” (Hughes). Therefore, he seeks to show that since he is American, he has a right to eat at the table away from discrimination. However, while at this time he was experiencing the scourge of discrimination, a time would come when he would be stronger and no one could ask him to leave as they saw his beauty and be ashamed. However, most profoundly, because he too was American same as them. The same theme is captured in ‘Theme for English B’. The poet shows that his experience significantly differs from his classmates because of his race since he was the only black in his class. However, he is keen to show that despite their differences, they had commonalities, such as what they liked and, most importantly, that they were American. He states, “You are white—yet a part of me, as I am a part of you. That’s American” (Hughes).
In conclusion, in the poems “I Too” and “Theme for English B”, Langston Hughes captured the African American experience in a racialized society and optimism in the unity of the American identity. The poet shows that despite the challenges that members of African Americans experienced in a racialized America where they were discriminated against because of their race, they still maintained optimism due to the unity that all had in the American identity.
Works Cited
Hughes, Langston. “Theme for English B” \1951. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47880/theme-for-english-b
Hughes, Langston. I, Too. 1926 https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47558/i-too
Kennedy, X. J. & Gioia, Dana. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing, 12th Edition January 8, 2012
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