Harlem Group

Question:

davidmann
davidmann
Student
College - Freshman

Who is speaking?

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Posted by davidmann on Wednesday September 30, 2009 at 1:21 PM and tagged with harlem, whos speaking in poem.

Answers:


  1. akannan Teacher
    Middle School

    eNotes Editor

    This is fairly interesting to examine.  I think that the speaker in the poem could be Hughes, himself.  The idea of Hughes positing himself in his poem could be quite plausible.  Given the background of articulating in his own mind the condition of African Americans in the early 20th Century, he certainly would be able to speak quite lucidly to the implications of deferred dreams.  Additionally, given the fact that Hughes was one of the first thinkers to give voice to the experience of African Americans as one that had a large impact on regionalism (Southern African Americans and African Americans in the North), such a perspective would effectively allow him to comment on the deferral of dreams in different settings.  Another potential explanation of the speaker could very well be someone whose dreams have been deferred repeatedly over time.  This can speak loudly to the idea of the intricacies in the deferral of one's dreams and how one perceives such elements in a myriad of ways, such as agony, forlornness, quiet despondency, or intense displays of anger.

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    Posted by akannan on Wednesday September 30, 2009 at 1:28 PM


  2. jk180 Teacher
    College - Senior

    eNotes Editor

    I would encourage you not to see the poet Hughes as the speaker in the poem "Harlem." It's certainly fair to see overlap between the two, but the "I" in the poem -- much like the "I" in "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" and in many of Hughes' other poems -- may very well be much larger than a single individual.

    Sources:
    http://www.enotes.com/harlem

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    Posted by jk180 on Thursday November 5, 2009 at 12:22 PM