What type of diction is used in "Ballad of the Landlord"?

This poem tells the story of a black man being discriminated against by his white landlord. The poem has three different speakers, and the diction of each of these speakers tells the story of their relationship and the harsh reality of the discrimination faced by African-Americans in the 1930s.

When the black resident is speaking we see small clues to an African-American dialect: “’member” in the first verse, for “remember,” the use of “is” in “these steps is broken down,” “Ten bucks more’n I’ll pay you,” the use of “gonna” and the deletion of the helping verb in the present continuous later on, as in “You talkin’ high and mighty,” and the use of “ain’t.” In these first four verses, the diction is focused on injustice, becoming more and more confrontational as the poem progresses. The first verse is an innocent reminder about the leak the resident told the landlord about the week before; the second verse is a little tongue-in-cheek, the resident noting that “When you come up yourself/It’s a wonder you don’t fall down.” In the third verse we have we have the repetition of “Ten bucks you say,” which adds an element of incredulity to the resident’s voice, and stresses the fact that he believes the ten bucks are not legitimate. In the fourth verse, the resident begins with an exclamation:  “What?” He is getting more exasperated, and frames the following lines as questions, though it is clear the actions have already been taken. This disbelief further emphasizes the unfairness of the landlord’s actions – the resident didn’t see them coming, and he clearly had no reason to believe he would be evicted, because he had done nothing wrong.

When the white landlord is speaking, in the penultimate verse, there is no hint of a dialect – his helping verbs are intact, and there is no shortening of other words. In contrast to the helpless questions asked by the resident, the white man’s lines are marked with exclamation points and intense hyperbole – “He’s trying to ruin the government/And overturn the land!” Exaggerated lies – vague yet damning accusations. The white man is calling upon the patriotism of the police, an irony given how he himself is turning against the values his country was founded upon by discriminating against the resident. The first line of this verse – “Police!  Police!” parallels that of the first two verses spoken by the black man – “Landlord, landlord,” and the calmness of the latter contrasts to the exclamatory nature of the former.  Even when the resident was angry, all he could do was ask rhetorical questions, a sign of his helplessness in this situation; his landlord’s exclamations are in contrast a sign of his dominance.

In the final verse we have a neutral speaker, and instead of phrases or sentences we have lines made up of single words: “Copper’s whistle!/Patrol bell!/Arrest./Precinct Station./Iron Cell.” This at first mirrors the excitement of the preceding verse, and then the exclamation points are replaced by periods. Resignation. A blunt acceptance of the action. These single-word lines, despite their brevity, give us a perfect understanding of what’s happening, and represent the immediacy with which one thing follows another, as well as the unquestionable nature of these events: a black man is arrested, and this leads inevitably to jail time. No question. No real trial. It’s like a factory output of discrimination, mechanical and smooth. Finally, in the last lines of the poem, we get a newspaper headline in all-caps, to sum up what has (or has not actually) happened in the poem. The resident is polite and collected, is provoked over a matter of days through negligence and passive aggression by his landlord, and is then framed by the latter and arrested for no true crime.

What poetic devices are used in "The Ballad of the Landlord"?

Langston Hughes's "The Landlord" uses colloquial diction to help create a sense of place and person, with particular language constructs, such as "these steps is broken down," suggesting African American vernacular. This is a deliberate choice on the part of Hughes to support the idea that the poem represents the plight of many African Americans who are mistreated by their landlords. The poem, a "ballad," is, like many ballads, an expression of complaint, and is a poetic structure that has been associated with the songs and poetry of working class and disenfranchised groups.

The use of parallelism in the poem is in keeping with the ballad structure, but serves to emphasize the speaker's unhappiness with the situation as he repeats the phrase "Ten bucks" with increasing incredulity. "Ten bucks you say I owe you? / Ten bucks you say is due?" The structure helps us picture, and hear, the speaker's outrage rising to a crescendo before he utilizes the phrase in a parallel structure which pivots the function of the "ten bucks": "that's Ten Bucks more'n I'l pay you . . . "

The poem effectively functions as a dialogue between two characters, although for the most part, we only hear the speaker's part. The continued use of questions gives us an indication of what the landlord is "saying" in reply—"What? You gonna get eviction orders?" But for the most part, it is the voice of the "Negro" we hear, a clear reversal of the real world, in which it would be the voice of the landlord that carried the most weight. Sadly, the final two stanzas of the poem give us an indication of what would really happen if a black man were to stand up to his landlord in this way: the landlord has only to shout "Police!" and the newspaper headlines would read: "MAN THREATENS LANDLORD," with the speaker of the poem in jail.

What poetic devices are used in "The Ballad of the Landlord"?

When examining the poetic devices used in Langston Hughes’ “The Ballad of the Landlord,” the form of the poem as a ballad is the first thing to be considered. Hughes writes the first six stanzas of the poem in ballad form consisting of a narrative which includes quatrains with a set rhyming pattern. In this case, the rhyming pattern is ABCB which provides a lyrical quality to the poem. As with most ballads, the speaker is an anonymous person representing a larger group. The narrator is speaking for all of the “Negro” tenants who were treated wrongfully by their landlords. His language is informal and realistic.

The final stanza written in ballad form is spoken by the landlord after he is threatened by the tenant, and includes the use of hyperbole or exaggeration as he says, “

He's trying to ruin the government

And overturn the land!

The tenant, although angry, is simply trying to obtain acceptable living conditions.

The last stanza of the poem deviates from this structure. The short, emphatic lines move the poem quickly to its end. The newspaper headline uses capital letters throughout which emphasizes its message and includes the word “Negro” to explain that the poem is speaking about the plight of African-Americans in Harlem during the 1930’s.

The tenant asks rhetorical questions of the landlord which another effective device. It is obvious that the tenant knows what his rent is but he asks questions. This is another way of emphasizing his message.

Ten Bucks you say I owe you?

Ten Bucks you say is due?

Another device that Hughes employs is repetition. The word “landlord” is repeated as the tenant states his case about the deplorable conditions of the rented house. Langston Hughes effectively uses a variety of poetic devices throughout he poem to convey his message of social injustice.