Selected Poems of Langston Hughes

By Langston Hughes

Book Overview

Langston Hughes electrified readers and launched a renaissance in Black writing in America--the poems in this collection were chosen by Hughes himself shortly before his death and represent stunning work from his entire career.

The poems Hughes wrote celebrated the experience of invisible men and women: of slaves who rushed the boots of Washington; of musicians on Lenox Avenue; of the poor and the lovesick; of losers in the raffle of night. They conveyed that experience in a voice that blended the spoken with the sung, that turned poetic lines into the phrases of jazz and blues, and that ripped through the curtain separating high from popular culture. They spanned the range from the lyric to the polemic, ringing out wonder and pain and terror--and the marrow of the bone of life.

The collection includes The Negro Speaks of Rivers, The Weary Blues, Still Here, Song for a Dark Girl, Montage of a Dream Deferred, and Refugee in America. It gives us a poet of extraordinary range, directness, and stylistic virtuosity.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 067972818X
• ISBN13: 9780679728184
• Release Date: September 1990
• Publisher: Vintage
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.69 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.1" x 7.9"

Customer Reviews

GOAT (Greatest of All Time)

This is my favorite author. I grew up loving his work and realized that this was the best and greatest era for exceptional literature. It was surprising that this work which is more than 60 years old still exists in such great shape. This book was great because the author chose to select his own favorites from his huge catalogue of works. This time, I will keep this as one of my treasures. These works include many of my favorites and 2 that are truly outstanding. They are: "The Negro Mother" and "Freedom Plow". Please pick up your copy, You will not be disappointed..

A Poet for all people!!!

The SELECTED POEMS of LANGSTON HUGHE by Langston Hughes is exactly what is implied by the title. Absent from these "selected poems" are the more radical and controversial poems written by Hughes in the 1930s. After Hughes was forced to testify before the anti-Communist committee to defend himself, he shied away from the radicalism that so entranced him and other Afro Americans who saw socialism as an better alternative to Jim Crow. In this selection of his poetry, there is no chronological order to the poems. Rather, they are divided into sections representing a specific theme. Here, Hughes was trying (?) to imitate Walt Whitman in arrangement. "Afro-American Fragments," "Feet of Jesus," "Shadow of the Blues," "Sea and Land," absent is the poem written for the Jamaican sailor Ferdinand Smith, SAILOR ASHORE, "Distance Nowhere," "After Hours," "Life is Fine," "Lament over Love," "Magnolia Flowers," "Name in Uphill Letter," "Madam to You," "Montage of a Dream Deferred," and "Words Like Freedom." The last section of poems reveal Hughes as a patriot which he actually was in life. Hughes believed in idea of the real USA and what the nation could be without prejudice. The poems I,TOO, DEMOCRACY, AFRICA, CONSIDER ME, REFUGEE IN AMERICA, FREEDOM TRAIN, THE NEGRO MOTHER and so on in this section are indicative of a patriotism despite injustices. For those interested in a more comprehensive ouvre of Hughes poetry, I strongly recommend the COLLECTED POETRY OF LANGSTON HUGHES edited by Arnold Rampersad and associate editor David Roessel. It contains the most up to date work by Hughes and "all" his "known and published" poems. I purposely emphasized "known and published" because according to some academics there is said to exist unpublished poems of Hughes written to a black male lover that has yet to surface. Langston Hughes is the poet of black America. His work captures the aspirations, hope, joy, tragedy, anger, and pride of many blacks past and present. But, he is also a poet for the working class man, black and of any race. There is a reason his poems have been translated into many languages and continue to inspire. The other reviews here capture some the essential essence of Hughes spirit.

Hughes is Pure

I had read several Hughes poems before buying this book, but I will admit that I had no grasp on the extent of his talent. These vivid poems were chosen by Hughes personally before his death in 1967. They do so well to paint a picture of the time he lived -- of the blues, of love, of passion, of choices. He writes about faith and protest in a way that will move you. I have read all of the poems exactly as they are placed in the book several times. I think I keep going back to them because this is poetry free of pretense -- it is grounded in reality and in sorrow.Independent of age, of your ethnicity, and of your literary grasp, you will enjoy these poems. Simple and superb -- read them out loud.

He, too, sang America

"Selected Poems of Langston Hughes" is a rich selection from several decades of this poet's work. Hughes (1902-1967) is a poet of many moods and voices. His work is at times mournful, humorous, sensuous, or ironic. Many poems capture the rhythms of African-American vernacular speech. A number of narrative poems tell stories of Black life, and a number of his best poems feature female speakers. He also writes poems of social protest that deal with the anti-Black violence that has plagued the United States for so much of its history.The poems in this book are divided into several sections. One of my favorite such sections, "Feet of Jesus," contains poems which evoke the prayers, preaching, and religious songs of African-American churches. "Madam to You" contains a number of poems in which Alberta K. Johnson tells her story. A strong-willed entrepreneur who often challenges authority figures, "Madam" is one of the most delightful characters in African-American literature.The other sections of the book contain many of Hughes' most memorable poems: the sensuous "Midnight Dancer" ("Lips / Sweet as purple dew"), "Mother to Son" ("Life for me ain't been no crystal stair"), "Theme for English B" ("I am the only colored student in my class"), and "I, Too" ("I, too, sing America. / I am the darker brother").The lines I quoted from "I, Too" may call to mind Walt Whitman's great American poem "Leaves of Grass." Indeed, I consider Hughes to be one of the great 20th century poetic heirs of Whitman, and "Selected Poems" is a magnificent testament to Hughes' passion and vision.

Dreams Deferred

Langston Hughes wrote poetry of exquisite pain and beauty throughout his life. His poetry can be sparse and rhythmic. It evinces visions of cities, the south, churches and deep muddy rivers.Hughes touches on every subject important to life in 20th century America: family, friends, race, religion,love, music, prejudice and poverty. Each poem sparingly provides an image in words. Together these poems represent the great work of a true artist of the American Poetry.One of his most popular and poignant poems is Harlem. It contains such beauty in his phrase - "a dream deferred" and such power in his words or does it explode?I recommend this highly to anyone interested in modern poets and poetry.

Simple but deep poetry... inspiring!

This book of poetry was so fun and fast-paced that I read it all in one sitting. Some of the poems are so incredibly simple that they speak right to you and you say "hmm... that's so true", but the concept is so deep you never would have thought about it in such a simple way. Other poems are really inspiring and they will make you think a lot about them before going on to the next one. In this Vintage Edition, the poems are grouped according to categories. For instance, "Afro-American Fragments" has a whole series of poems that speak of slavery and segregation that helped me understand even better the life of the people who overcame these tragedies, while "Lament Over Love" speaks about the pains of unrequited love that just about anyone can relate to. One of my favorite categories was "Madam to You", which is a series of poems all about one lady and what she does during her life, such as "Madam and the Rent Man" and "Madam and the Phone Bill Collector".I was lucky to have read these poems so soon after reading The Souls of Black Folk, by W.E.B. DuBois, because it embraced the theme of double conciousness that I found there. It also showed the double conciousness of African-Americans in regard to religion, which is an important theme in DuBois' book.While I read the book I marked the pages of the poems I liked a lot. By the time I was finished I had a huge amount of dog-eared pages marking my "favorite" spots! I haven't read many complete books of poetry but I extremely enjoyed this one and it prompted me to read more. I recommend it for anyone, whether you're new to reading a lot of poetry at once (like me), or whether you are a poetry fanatic who for some reason have failed to get your hands on poetry by Langston Hughes yet.