Langston Hughes’s “Negro”

Context

“Negro” was first published in 1922 in his collection titled The Crisis. The poem emphasizes Hughes’s pride in his identity and a general history of Black Americans. It is divided into six short stanzas. Those stanzas present the history of African-American people, starting and ending with their identity, stressing their contributions to the civilization, and how they have been treated all along.

The poem is written in a free verse, meaning the poem follows no strict use of no rhyme scheme or metrical pattern. There are plentiful illusions to empires which have connections to slavery but have also collapsed, such as the Romans, the Egyptian Pharaohs, and the Belgian Congo; these are contrasted with contemporary America and the poor treatment of African Americans.

Consider the first and last stanza: these stanzas are repeated, and are therefore cyclical, never ending. What might be implied via this, particularly in a poem which includes fallen empires and contemporary America? Moreover, these are the only two stanzas written in the present tense. What might be important about this?

I am a Negro:

        Black as the night is black,

        Black like the depths of my Africa.

I’ve been a slave:

        Caesar told me to keep his door-steps clean.

        I brushed the boots of Washington.

I’ve been a worker:

        Under my hand the pyramids arose.

        I made mortar for the Woolworth Building.

I’ve been a singer:

        All the way from Africa to Georgia

        I carried my sorrow songs.

        I made ragtime.

I’ve been a victim:

        The Belgians cut off my hands in the Congo.

        They lynch me still in Mississippi.

I am a Negro:

        Black as the night is black,

        Black like the depths of my Africa.

Like other Hughes poetry, his speaker begins with a declarative in the first person. What might you say about this?

The first stanza includes a semantic field of darkness in relation to being Black American. What might be significant about this?

Here, Hughes’s speaker uses a simile comparing his colour to the night. What effect does this simile/imagery have?

Another simile is used to compare his colour to being deep in relation to Africa. What does this mean?

What is significant about the speaker referring to Africa as “my Africa”?

The tense of the poem changes to the present perfect, which often indicates experiences in our lives. What might this imply?

Here, the speaker alludes to Caesar, a Roman emperor who was murdered. He uses an imperative, placing himself as the object, with Caesar as the subject. How does this reflect power?

What effect does this imagery have in relation to the themes of the poem?

What effect does the alliterative use of the plosive /b/ sound have here?

In this line, the speaker alludes to George Washington, one of the Founding Fathers and first president of America. What effect does he have in including this line to one of Ancient Rome?  How does he explore America’s history?

In the previous stanza, the speaker describes how he has been a slave; in this, he states how he has been a worker, and in the next a singer. What is important about this sequence?

The speaker uses metonymy as he did not personally build the pyramids,  but uses himself to refer to Black people in general.

The speaker uses juxtaposition with words like “under” and “arose”. What is the effect of this?

Again, the speaker alludes to fallen empires in this line, followed by a more contemporary America in the next. What is important about this?

Does the alliteration of the /m/ sound have a particular effect in this line?

How does this title differ from the others? Does this stanza have a different tone or atmosphere as a result? Moreover, this stanza is longer, breaking the rules of the others. What might be significant about this in relation to its general idea?

This line alludes to the slave trade and slavery in the American South (Georgia being a Southern State).

Is there any effect with the use of sibilance in this line?

Again, the speaker uses the personal pronoun “my” but means Black people in general. What might these “sorrow songs” be a metaphor for? What effect is achieved from the diction of “sorrow”?

Ragtime is a genre of music associated with Jazz and Blues, which was made by Black artists.

In this stanza, the speaker reflects on the violence inflicted on Black people, both in Africa and in contemporary America.

The horrors of the Belgian Congo are atrocious. If you’d like to learn more about this, click HERE. You can watch from the hyperlinked section to learn about violence, or watch the whole video to learn about the Belgian Congo in more detail.

Lynchings, or mob murders, were a present danger for African Americans, particularly in the South. One of the most famous cases was the lynching of Emmett Till in Mississippi in 1955 (decades after Hughes’s poem). Click HERE to learn more.

What impact does Hughes’s inclusion of word “still” have? What about his use of the word “they”? To whom is he referring?

Consider the first and last stanza: these stanzas are repeated, and are therefore cyclical, never ending. What might be implied via this, particularly in a poem which includes fallen empires and contemporary America? Moreover, these are the only two stanzas written in the present tense. What might be important about this?

Does darkness become a symbol in the poem? What could it symbolize?