Preview

Analysis of a Poem “We wear the mask”

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
932 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Analysis of a Poem “We wear the mask”
Amber Davis
Professor Quirk
Literature 101
February 28, 2013

We Wear the Mask The lyric poem “We wear the mask” by Paul Laurence Dunbar is a poem about the African American race, and how they had to conceal their unhappiness and anger from whites. This poem was written in 1895, which is around the era when slavery was abolished. Dunbar, living in this time period, was able to experience the gruesome effects of racism, hatred and prejudice against blacks at its worst. Using literary techniques such as: alliteration, metaphor, persona, cacophony, apostrophe and paradox, Paul Dunbar’s poem suggests blacks of his time wore masks of smiling faces to hide their true feelings.
In the first stanza, he starts off with the title of the poem stating, “we wear the mask that grins and lies” (1). In the first line he uses a metaphor to explain the “mask” that is put on to show grins. Of course there is no actual mask, but the mask can be a representation of a fake personality that is happy or blissful. It could be said that the reason for this “mask” is to prevent their tormentors from starting any controversy. Dunbar also uses another metaphor, “This debt we pay to human guile…” (3). Obviously he does not mean that there is a debt to human guile that he is paying with money, but rather since blacks have always been seen as deceptive since slave times, they must forever live in it. Since slave times blacks have not been respected. Even after blacks received the right to vote and own land, the federal system still made it hard for blacks to make a breakthrough. The use of metaphor is used to describe the overwhelming struggles blacks had to go through in a white man’s world. Through the use of metaphors, Dunbar implies the feelings the blacks once had to fake in order to not get into any trouble.
The second stanza, especially, emphasizes the poems paradox and alliteration. This stanza

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The author uses imagery to illustrate and give the reader a clear understanding of his thoughts about injustice. Dunbar uses imagery by stating, “ Till it’s blood is red on the cruel bars” (line 9). This shows the bird’s relentless efforts to escape. The author includes this to relate the bird’s struggles and hardships to his own dealing with injustice. Another way Dunbar uses imagery to relate to injustice is by stating, “ When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore, When he beats his bars and he would be free; It is not a carol of joy or glee, But a prayer he sends from his heart’s deep core”( lines 16-19). Here the author uses imagery to show the reader that even when the bird is in pain he still fights for freedom and justice. The author uses this piece of imagery to relate himself to the bird in the sense of that like the bird, the author fights for his freedom, but along the way is…

    • 373 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    W.E.B DuBois’s “The Souls of Black Folk”, introduces “the veil” and “double-consciousness” as two concepts that describe the typical Black experience in America. The concepts gave a name to the agony that many African-Americans felt but could not express. The concept of “the veil” refers to three things. The 1st veil refers to the dark skin of Blacks, which is a physical distinction from whiteness. The 2nd veil refers to a white person’s ability to clearly see Blacks as real Americans. The 3rd veil refers to Black person’s ability to clearly see themselves outside of the description that White America prescribes for them.…

    • 327 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    We Wear the Mask

    • 628 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The poem starts with Dunbar using the word "we" to speak for the entire black population. He does this because he is painfully aware of the social, economical, and political status of people of his own race. Throughout the entire poem, he illustrates the terrible injustices they had to endure while "wearing the mask" to hide their true emotions behind a smile. An example of this can be seen in line 4, "With torn and bleeding hearts we smile." This line conveys the message that even though they were grossly mistreated, they had no choice but to keep smiling.…

    • 628 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    “There was nothing to do but what we were told.” (Ellison 281par.3). This imagery of the white blindfold is an allegory and it is effective because it strips them of their identities, or their place in society. Each man is now for himself, or so it seems. “It was complete anarchy. Everybody fought everybody else. No group fought together for long.”(Ellison 283 par.1). Little to the narrators knowledge all of the other men have made an agreement amongst themselves as to who would be left to duke it out in the…

    • 1075 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Dunbar uses an apostrophe to end the poem “we smile, but, O great Christ, our cries To thee from tortured souls arise”. It is talking to Christ that this “mask” won’t go away as long as the African American population get the equal…

    • 160 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The metaphor of the veil is a strong representation of the separation that was very present in years after the Civil War, and of the separation that remains today. Du Bois describes double consciousness with the word twoness. Du Bois then says “An American, a Negro” (Du Bois 536) not just Americans. The separation that takes place is felt by everyone, white or black, young or old, male or female. Du Bois helps bring attention to how wrong the separation of black and white is by using metaphors and ideas created from his own experiences to write a powerful collection of…

    • 577 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The poem shows how people wear a facade from the world. We all wear masks in front of others whether it is purposely or naturally. It shows how people hide the way they really feel. It seems so many people in this world wear masks. So many are afraid to show others what they're really like. It's amazing what problems can come from it; Problems that may not have existed if the masks weren't there. Everyone wishes to feel accepted in life, and the character in Dunbar's poem is no exception. We wish to fit in with our peers, so we "wear the mask that grins and lies." (Dunbar, ). We will hide what we really feel so that we may feel accepted. On the other hand, no one likes being humiliated. It is a horrible experience and most people would do anything to avoid it. Most would wear a mask while smiling "with torn and bleeding hearts." (Dunbar, ), So we hide our true feelings to avoid humiliation. So, one uses a mask to hide…

    • 1729 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the beginning of the poem, the author introduces a situation that contrasts a white person with a black. Correspondingly, she applies imagery to emphasize this difference greatly. For example, the shoes he is wearing at the time are black “laced with white” and compares them to “intentional scars.” These scars correlate to to the discrimination against blacks by whites in society, conveying that whites purposely discriminate against blacks. The image is portraying that whites are more powerful than blacks. Additionally, she describes the…

    • 396 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Black Americans were coerced to only see themselves from a perception of whiteness. W.E.B. Du Bois’s, The Souls of Black Folks, states, “…the American Negro, ‘born with a veil…’ can achieve ‘no true self-consciousness’ but can only ‘see himself through the revelation of the other [i.e. white] world’” ( DuBois 410). Morrison herself notes “…that slaves narrators, ‘shaping the experience to make it palatable’ for white readers, dropped a ‘veil’ over ‘their interior life’” (Rody 97). This “veil” represents obdurate ideals of white oppression exercised before and subsequently after the period of slavery. In Beloved, Morrison posits an erroneous assertion in the relationship between veils and slavery:…

    • 329 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Final Paper Despite living in a country that is known for equality, justice and freedom, what many do not know is the amount of unequal and prejudice treatments many people are subjected to every day. Gender and race play a big role is the equality system in America despite popular belief. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ruled that discrimination against any race, religion, sex or ethnicity would be illegal and punishable by law. Unfortunately, there have been many cases of racism and some have even gotten away with it.…

    • 1169 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Although this story is fiction in genre, this particular part of the book speaks to the volume of the newly developed “second face” that some darker skinned blacks had shown to some lighter skinned blacks. In the novel, Lady Jones was described as “indiscriminately polite, and very well mannered,” and she was still treated terribly by the seemingly only people she could even come close to call her “allies.” While Lady Jones tried her best to assimilate into black culture, the main character in “The Autobiography Of An Ex-Colored Man” seemingly tried to integrate himself into white culture. Weldon knew that in order to become a successful musician in the United States, he had to act as if he was a white man, and his first time witnessing a lynching only solidified that fact. As the ex-colored man began to write his own music in the South, he bore witness to a horrible and gruesome act of torture upon a young black…

    • 767 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the poem, “The White Man’s Burden,” Rudyard Kipling explicitly writes about the deterioration of society as a union. The metaphor in line two suggests that the white men have to “wait in heavy harness,” (Kipling 5) due to the fact that these “strangers” are weighing down, or burdening, the “worth” of the whites. Kipling persists on labeling the white men as higher up than the natives, whom he referred to as the “fluttered folk and wild” (Kipling 6). The strangers in this society, as shown in the quote, are compared to animals that aimlessly wander the streets of their village. They are mocked and belittled. Such people are referred to as “half deviled half child” (Kipling 8). They have become such a “burden” for the white folks, who have to help out the world’s inferior, uncivilized animals.…

    • 448 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Black Skin, White Masks” also explores the role of the black man in white culture. The title itself is an indication of how Fanon feels about the role; how black people wear white…

    • 714 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    I believe the poem speaks out during a time in history when black people experienced brutal abuse and injustice at the hands of white slave masters or overseers. They were forced to live in unlivable condition and eat unhealthy foods. I believe that “We wear the mask that grins and lies” points out how oppressed black people were forced to wear a mask to hide their pain and suffering. I believe that “We” referred to black people, “the mask” was the way they concealed their true feeling of grief, sadness, and anger from whites as well as one another. “Grins and lies” were the camouflaged facial expression wore to portray happiness and contentment, and one of the strategies for survival in a prejudice and discriminatory white world. It also compares black Americans to that of black performers on stage who “sing,” and wear the “black face” while silently their “cries… and tortured souls arise,” “and mouth with myriad subtleties,” points out that blacks wanted to speak out, but was afraid to speak out publicly and let the whites know how they really felt about the mistreatment, prejudices, and inequality that was brought against them, because if they did they risked dangerous consequences.…

    • 340 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Battle Royal

    • 568 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Ellison uses appalling imagery to allow the reader to visualize the obscurities the young narrator faces only to be neglected during his speech. The imagery used to describe the narrator being blindfolded only to fight against other young, imbecilic African Americans, to only earn tokens, shows the nefarious white men using them for cynical entertainment. “Suddenly I saw a boy lifted into the air, glistening with sweat like a circus seal, and dropped, his wet back landing flush upon the charged rug” (Ellison, 194). The reader can imagine the young helpless boy being thrown around only to provide sheer entertainment, thus evoking pity for him by the reader. By treating them as circus animals the white men maintain supremacy over them.…

    • 568 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays