Annotated Bibliography: Maya Angelou Angelou, Maya. I know why the caged bird sings. New York: random house, 1970. Print. Maya Angelou's book describes in great detail the events of her forming years and her emotions throughout.
A successful writer turns literature into a poem with rhetorical devices in order to connect with the readers. Maya Angelou lived a life of poverty and hardship but turned it into something beautiful. Some examples of her most famous pieces are "Caged Bird," "Still I Rise" and "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." She uses diction, syntax, and imagery to convey her message of perseverance in overcoming oppression, racism, and finding herself. Maya Angelou employs diction to communicate her emotions and thoughts to her readers.
Personifications can make the object more meaningful and completely change the meaning with human characteristics. It adds depth to the story and changes the way you see an object. Ray Bradbury uses Personifications really well and it adds depth to the story and helps you think critically to what you just read. Maybe the ¨happylife home¨ is not so happy, maybe it is a lonely sad house.
Soldiers receiving a draft letter for war is typically a very hard and stressful time in their lives, especially the draft for Vietnam, the only draft America has had so far. Most of the men being drafted were young and unexperienced in war, making them hate it even more. They were taken and dropped into some of the worst circumstances the U.S. military has ever seen and expected to fight alongside people they had never even met before. As the war went on, the platoon members would bond, and have to watch their new friends get injured or die right in front of them, and wonder why they didn’t die as well. The harshness of the war made the soldiers look for any kind of escape from reality or way to make war easier, and they found drugs to be
One example of personification is when comes to visit Grant after work: “A little farther over, where another patch of cane was standing, tall and blue-green, you could see the leaves swaying softly from a breeze.” (Gaines 86) The use of personification is effective because it allows the reader to visualise. In this instance, it creates an image of the leaves swaying in the wind.
How does it help you envision what the author is trying to convey? Today, we’re going to take a look at personification. Today 's lesson objective is: Students will write poetry that includes personification.
III. a. Maya Angelou was an avid writer, speaker, activist and teacher. As a result of the many hardships that she suffered while growing up as a poor black woman in the south she has used her own experiences as the subject matter of her written work. In doing this she effectively shows how she was able to overcome her personal obstacles. Her autobiography “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1970) tells the story of her life and how she overcame and moved forward triumphantly in spite of her circumstances.
For example, the author uses personification in the sentence which states, “. . .bits of paper danced between the parked cars.” By using personification the author helps the reader to infer the scenery as empty, abandoned, and a run-down, deserted area. Also, the author uses a simile in the sentence, “His father’s words like the distant thunder that now echoed through the streets of Harlem. . .” The author describes the character as a big, loud man.
Maya Angelou recalls the first seventeen years of her life, discussing her unsettling childhood in her autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Maya and Bailey were sent from California to the segregated South to live with their grandmother, Momma. At the age of eight, Maya went to stay with her mother in St. Louis, where she was sexually abused and raped by her mother’s boyfriend, Mr. Freeman. Maya confronts these traumatic events of her childhood and explores the evolution of her own strong identity. Her individual and cultural feelings of displacement, caused by these incidents of sexual abuse, are mediated through her love for literature.
Maya Angelou uses the extended metaphor to compare life to a road, because like a road, life is a path that's taken. However, also like a road, it's possible to change direction, to “step off that road, and cut… a new path. ”(Angelou 1.)Annie Johnson was forced to change her direction when she was left with her two sons and lack of money, due to her husband leaving for Oklahoma to pursue religion. The purpose of the metaphor is to show the reader that life isn’t one straight line, and “if the future road looms ominous or unpromising, and the roads back uninviting” (Angelou 2) then there’s always a possibility to change that path or road to something more desirable.
In the opening paragraphs, Angelou uses suspenseful imagery to indicate that a crucial event is about to occur. Beginning the chapter, with “the last inch of space was filled,” paints a crowded and high energy scene for the reader. She continues this claustrophobic description by showing the layers of people “perched on every lap available.” In addition, a good indicator is the mood. Not only is the atmosphere described as “apprehensive,” but the author also facilitates her own description with sharp dialogue that pierces the scene.
In the memoir, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou forms a connection with her reader through relatable stories with intimate details of her discomfort to convey her message of the hardships she faced as being an outcast in a community that is full of outcasts from society. Angelou at a young age wants to her peers to accept her, but instead, when she pees her pants in church, she ends up yet again an outsider as “giggles hung in the air” from the other Sunday school children (5). She uses descriptive words and phrases to trigger the reader to remember times in their life when they had gone through an uncomfortable and embarrassing situation. Not fitting into the community Angelou believes that she should be white, but instead, something
It can turn ordinary phrases into a new, deepened and more meaningful message. It makes the author 's writing better and gives the reader and new look on the main message. It enhances the poem and evokes the reader which overall, makes the poem enjoyable. It allows the author to convey the desired message through metaphorical and symbolic imagery rather than just words and language.
Maya Angelou was a very strong and well spoken woman who spoke her mind through the themes of her poetry. Using the figurative, ideational, sonic, and structural levels of poetry Angelou creates a very powerful theme to her poem. The figurative level of poetry develops the power and the core to her theme behind discrimination towards blacks and personal strength. The sonic level contributes to more of the overall development of the theme by addressing its core. Additionally, the ideational level of poetry touches down on the speaker and author’s purpose, and how they are relevant in the theme.
“Caged Bird” written by Maya Angelou in 1968 announces to the world her frustration of racial inequality and the longing for freedom. She seeks to create sentiment in the reader toward the caged bird plight, and draw compassion for the imprisoned creature. (Davis) Angelou was born as “Marguerite Annie Johnson on April 4, 1928 in St Louis, Missouri”. “Caged Bird” was first published in the collection Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing? 1983.
