Gwendolyn Brooks, an African American Poet Essay

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“Gwendolyn Brooks, an African American poet who was the first black author to receive the coveted publisher prize, was born in Topeka, Kansas, but she was bought up in Chicago. Her father was a janitor and mother was a school teacher.” (Gwendolyn Brooks (1917 – 2000). As a child, she had seen the ugly side of racial discrimination and such practices had remained an influence in most of her writings. Luckily for the author, her parents were both supportive of her reading and writing and they encouraged her in her endeavors. (Gwendolyn Brooks (1917 – 2000). Her poems are known to reflect real experience, mostly derived from her life.

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Besides, her poetry enjoys particular popularity because they deal with the issues of the present time and are upbeat, containing the themes of the wayward nature of youth and its drastic consequences. Thus, the author always sought to forewarn the youngsters of the negative results of their thoughtless actions and tried to motivate them to gain education and become successful in life.

Gwendolyn’s poem, “We Real Cool” can be seen as a creation triggered by the deep insight that she gained into human lives through her personal experiences. It is a fact that the youth of the modern-day does not have any clear sense of morality and they do not care much for the values that their previous generation has cherished. They seldom recognize the significance of education and skip classes without any valid reason. The author in this poem narrates the saga of some such teenagers who do not have a clear sense of purpose in whatever they do. The seven boys who leave school and go to play pool are examples of the carefree nature of the young generation in the modern world.

As a result of ignoring their education, some of them become dropouts from school and finally leave the institution without even getting a high school diploma. Ultimately, they do not even get a good job and in the end, become failures in their lives. Obviously, by writing this poem, Gwendolyn Brooks intends to reach out to her audience and wants to impress upon them the importance of education and leading a disciplined life. Therefore, she shares her poem so that the youngsters will take the correct decision and choose the right path in life.

Gwendolyn’s poem is a reflection of the thoughts of the youth. They think that they are cool and can do anything they want to. Once they leave school they start acting like adults and think that the world is in their hands. They roam around late at night, have parties, and drink a lot. They do as they wish. But this is not what should happen. Youngsters should not have this feeling in their minds. The poet ultimately says “We die soon,” and this is the thing that happens.

The poet, through her work, wants to warn the youth that drinking and merry-making will fetch them no positive results and finally will end up in their destruction. It is not a fantasy it is the reality. There is not even a tinge of the lie in it. This poem is a perfect projection of the truth.

In my opinion, the poem is a profound tribute to the youth of today, from an author who has learned a lot from her life. Any serious reader of literature who reads this poem will immediately recognize the message that the writer wants to convey to her audience. Moreover, the aforesaid poem gives several positive vibes to the readers, making them think and understand the pitfalls they will have to face in life and how to overcome those. It has the strength to change people’s life and alter the way they look at things. However, the poem is too subtle for an average reader to comprehend, and only if the audience reads it carefully and thinks about it deeply the meaning will become clear.

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The dexterity of the author becomes conspicuous in the manner in which she mentions the shovel at the beginning of the poem, which effectively works as a device of foreshadowing when she mentions death, which is the payback for wayward living, in the end. Though the poem is short, it has a lot of inner meaning in it, which is a little difficult to understand in the first read. The poem can help turn a new leaf in the books of lives of the people who choose to live a carefree life, without paying heed to values and morals and those who fail to recognize the importance of education and discipline in life. It can open their eyes and their minds too.

Overall, it can be said that by writing the poem, the author wants to communicate a message to society, especially to the youngsters, to desist from wrong things and focus on the right things in life. Thus, it may be rightly stated that the poem is written with a noble purpose and the author wants to share her pains so that the next generation will learn a lesson and assign importance to necessary things in life.

Works Cited

. Poetry Foundation. 2010. Web.

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IvyPanda. 2021. "Gwendolyn Brooks, an African American Poet." December 20, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/gwendolyn-brooks-an-african-american-poet/.

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IvyPanda. "Gwendolyn Brooks, an African American Poet." December 20, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/gwendolyn-brooks-an-african-american-poet/.

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