by Larry Lounsbury

Created on: June 18, 2009

The Writers concept of the American Dream

The era of the roaring twenties seemed to reflect a literary flowering of innocence come of age. Writers came from all walks of life, including rich, blacks, Jewish, and women writers were bent on exposing the real side of life. Their writing echoed a spirit that reflected a sense of searching out and forming the new image of humanity from the ashes of the wars they experienced.

Looking through the mirror of an image marred by the embattled dreams of mankind, a black writer named Countee Cullen welded a mighty pen bent on redefining the entire essence of the Blackman's aspirations. His transition somehow seemed to reflect the transition he endured as an Orphan adopted by the Reverend Frederick A. and Carolyn Belle (Mitchell) Cullen. He went by the name of Countee Porter until 1918 until he finally changed it to Countee Cullen. It was if his writing mimicked the inner struggle he felt between accepting a Christian upbringing on one hand, or the unbridled challenge of discovering his former roots. The place of his birth was at first listed as Louisville, Kentucky Sometime before 1918, but later scholars find it listed as either New York City or Baltimore. Countee's attempt to rework his inner man reflected his skill as a prolific writer of poetic verse. His academic training enabled him to write "white" verse-ballads, sonnets, quantrains, in the former manner of such greats as Keats and other British romantics, mixed with the flavor of racial concerns. Cuntee was resolute in his belief that traditional verse forms could not be bettered by more modern paradigms. Countee could not be blamed for struggling with the concept of a universal man, when the entire history of man has been an attempt to capture the essence of who we are. His novel "One Way to Heaven" ,is considered one of the better black satires and is one of the three important fictional retrospectives of the Harlem Renaissance. What is striking for any reader is Countee's notable analogue between blacks and Simon " Simon the Cyrenian Speaks," the Simon which was compelled to carry the cross of Jesus Christ on his back. Through examination of one line of his work " I Have a Rendezvous with Life" one soon understands that Countee Cullen had no false hopes. "... I am betrothed to Beauty, scarred With suffering though she may be; In that she bears pain splendidly, Her comeliness may not be marred. The long, thin sword of dreams I wield Is

• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5
• 6
• Next Page >>