Essay # 3 – Poetry

Please write a 2 page essay (12 times new roman, double spaced) on the poetry of Langston Hughes. As the instructions below highlight, your essay may be focused on 1 or more of the 8 Langston Hughes poems that we have read for the course.

In order to do your essay, you must only rely upon:

your understanding of the poems that we have;

the short video clip on Hughes available in the Unit 3 folder of course content;

Hughes essay The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain;

the professors notes;

YOUR MOST IMPORTANT WEAPONRY YOUR THOUGHTS!!!

*anything that looks, walks, smells, breathes, or laughs like an internet source in the first paragraph or the rest of the essay will lead to immediate failure!!! 

So, here is how you should go about writing your assignment:

Write a paragraph that discusses Langston Hughes poetry in a general way. Talk about what kinds of subjects and themes that his poetry explores.

Choose a poem by Hughes and discuss its theme and how that theme is developed through the use of images and/or sounds. If you want to focus on just one image (metaphor/simile) or one aspect of sound, then that is ok. The important thing is to make sure that you explain how the image/images or sound/sounds are related to the theme, as you have explained it. If you need separate paragraphs for explaining theme, images, and sounds, then use them.

If step 2 has not got you to 2+ pages of writing, then do step 2 over again with another poem. Add a third or more, if you need or want to.

So, ultimately, you need to write an introduction paragraph that talks about topic and theme in Hughes poetry in a general way (step 1). Then you need to discuss theme and its development through image (metaphor/simile) and/or sound in at least one poem. If you need or want to, you should discuss more than one poem!