Harlem Renaissance Poets Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 7

Harlem Renaissance Poets - Essay Example The author’s role and importance will be described, and the elements of double consciousness in their poems will be identified. Subsequently, the primary themes in the poetry of the time will be described and finally, I will present my own poem that expresses the identified themes of the Harlem renaissance. Poetry had a significant place in this movement because of its brevity of expression. There were many scholars of the time who stand out as representatives of the movements. Langston Hughes, a poet and scholar, was an outspoken critic of the racial polarization between the White and Black races in America. He also criticized some Black writers who he saw as adopting Eurocentric values while still championing for social equality. His poems explored the Black experience with a sensibility that captured its struggles, resilience, beauty, and complexity. Although he was later criticized for being a racial chauvinist, Hughes introduced a new literary aesthetic that celebrated African-American forms of literary expression (Shaduri, 2010). Hughes’ emphasis on racial consciousness and Black cultural nationalism would later influence many writers. Hughes’s recognition of the dualism of his experience as both encompassing the African and American is aptly captured in his seminal poem The Negro Speaks of Rivers. In The poem, the persona declares his involvement with the rivers Euphrates, Congo, Nile, and Mississippi. As a result of the persona’s diverse experiences and imbrications in the cultures of the African and American continents, the persona reminds the reader that: â€Å"my soul has grown deep like the rivers.† While there is a psychological, cultural, and artistic dilemma invoked by the involvement of both cultures and histories with each other, Hughes’s refrain suggests transcendence over them, implying complexity and richness of the African-American experience. Countee Cullen also engaged and questioned the complexity of the