Human Cruelty In The Lynching By Mckay And Langston Hughes

The Harlem Renaissance was a beneficial time in history for African Americans. Bringing blacks together in a new movement that had not been present in America yet. This was a movement in which blacks emphasized themselves by taking on their racial identity. It was a time period in which the black community helped each other to be able to express themselves as who they truly are, creating a true African American visual creativity, in this example it is that of poetry. This time period in history inspired many writers such as these two that will be touched upon in this paper, which are Claude McKay and Langston Hughes. This analysis of McKay’s poem, “The Lynching” and Langston Hughes poem, “Mulatto”, will give a prospective on how both take on a theme of human cruelty in their own ways. “The Lynching” by Claude McKay, speaks about several forms of cruelty. One of the worst

Since the times of slavery there have been problems of children who were born to those of a white father, a master. This caused intense emotional trauma to the children who are conceived from the acts of their mothers being raped. This poem dealt with not the physical part of cruelty, but the emotional. This writing is of a young boy who is trying to express his frustration of being a mulatto, being born of both a black and a white parent, and never being able to feel excepted in neither the black or white race. The opening of Hughes “Mulatto” is words expressed from the boy to his white father, “I am your son, white man! / You are my son! Like Hell” (1-6). The rejection and lack of love is obvious in how this father feels for his son, just in the fact because he is of different skin color. A form of human cruelty that is very devastating to a child or anyone for that matter. People crave to be accepted and wanted. Being turned away and looked upon as a nothing is cruel and