Poetry Explication on “The Negro Speaks of Rivers”
Langston Hughes's poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” is about becoming free. The speaker states that he has been to several places around the world. Each one of these places progressively gets more free. This is until the speaker ends with the time when “Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans”(7). Which was the final step for African Americans and their freedom. By doing this, Hughes’s speaker implies that the African American’s journey to freedom has come a long way throughout history.
The speaker expresses the theme of the poem through abstract words and personification. First he says “I bathed in the Euphrates when the dawns were young”(4). This is an example of personification because the
Langston Hughes's poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” is about becoming free. The speaker states that he has been to several places around the world. Each one of these places progressively gets more free. This is until the speaker ends with the time when “Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans”(7). Which was the final step for African Americans and their freedom. By doing this, Hughes’s speaker implies that the African American’s journey to freedom has come a long way throughout history.
The speaker expresses the theme of the poem through abstract words and personification. First he says “I bathed in the Euphrates when the dawns were young”(4). This is an example of personification because the