Masks (Masterplots II: Poetry, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Wilsonia Benita Driver
- First Published: 1984
- Type of Work: Lyric
- Genres: Poetry, Lyric poetry
- Subjects: African Americans, Social reform, Racism, Social issues, Prostitution or prostitutes, Hope, Oppression, Masks, Employment or employees, Lakes
The Poem
“Masks” is a poem of forty mostly short, free-verse lines about the struggle African Americans face in defining themselves. The masks to which the title refers are not only those that blacks in America have adopted to protect themselves but also those that have been forced upon them.
The critic Houston Baker, Jr., sees two primary voices present in Sonia Sanchez’s poetry. She has what he calls a “Greenwich Village/E. E. Cummings” voice, marked by a personal tone and a loud, confrontational voice that seems to explore the revolutionary edges of what a...
[The entire page is 1420 words long]
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