Why the caged bird sings summary. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Summary 2019-01-11

Why the caged bird sings summary Rating: 6,4/10 161 reviews

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

why the caged bird sings summary

She comes to learn how the pressures of living in a thoroughly racist society have profoundly shaped the character of her family members, and she strives to surmount them. She became a close associate of , and later of , Jr. The depression hits Stamps, and leads to difficulty making ends meet. Their grandmother runs a store there, which is the center of life in the Negro community of the town. Maya gets to her dad's house and meets his girlfriend, Dolores, who doesn't like her too much. Angelou's energetic delvings into the black community of the Depression-era South reject dolor and self-pity in favor of a full range of emotions — from wonderment at an older brother's bold, funny shenanigans to his vulnerability and dismay at a bloated corpse pulled from a pond and deposited in a jail cell — from tentative exploration of boy-girl relations to emotional release in the singing of the black national anthem.

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Analysis of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

why the caged bird sings summary

The caged bird represents African Americans and their sorrowful plight compared to the white Americans. Dolores is upset and insults Maya's mother, and Maya slaps her; Dolores cuts Maya somehow, and Maya has to run away to protect herself. Journalist Greg Hitt remarks on the recurrent themes of growth and self-evaluation, which she pursues with honesty and candor. She moved to New York and earned a role in the Gershwin opera Porgy and Bess. Despite the freedom that the Black Americans seemed to have in those times, there was still restrictions on opportunities that are open to them.

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I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS BY MAYA ANGELOU

why the caged bird sings summary

So many things happen to Maya Angelou but she was amazing and a brave woman too not everyone would be same after what happen to her. Maya takes a local lover as her first encounter, only to find herself pregnant. Then she decides she wants to go home and her mom buys her a ticket; Maya arrives home in San Francisco, her mother having no idea of Maya's adventures during the summer. She gets to the border, but runs into the car in front of her; she wakes her father and he simply patches things up and drives them home. But, a few weeks later, she finds out that she is pregnant. Anyone can earn credit-by-exam regardless of age or education level. She feels worse about this lie than anything else.

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I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou: Summary

why the caged bird sings summary

She decides to get a boyfriend, so she asks a good-looking neighbor boy to have sex with her, and they do. Her bravest act of defiance happens when she becomes the first black streetcar conductor in San Francisco. At sixteen, she hides her pregnancy from her mother and stepfather for eight months and graduates from high school. Freeman is at fault, his abuse makes Marguerite feel guilty. Reaffirming the idea that the bird opens his mouth to sing because his desire for freedom and his desire to express himself cannot be contained.

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I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou: Summary

why the caged bird sings summary

She does not yet know that the outcome of her cry to serve fair opportunities to Black Americans like her. Facebook 0 Twitter 0 Google+ 0 Viber WhatsApp Understanding the Poem, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings The poem entitled, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, is probably one of the most moving poetry works written by far. She was a woman… 1048 Words 5 Pages contribute to the way she grows up and the person she becomes. Indeed, for African Americans in general, Maya notes, naming is a sensitive issue because it provides a sense of identity in a hostile world that aims to stereotype blacks and erase their individuality and identity. He tells of the much better opportunities given to the white school in town, and then mentions that some graduates of the black school have managed to become athletes.

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I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Ch. 1

why the caged bird sings summary

Angelou, with the metaphor of birds, represents the inequality of justice seen in the society of her time which differentiates between the African-American community and its White American counterpart. Autoplay next video A free bird leaps on the back Of the wind and floats downstream Till the current ends and dips his wing In the orange suns rays And dares to claim the sky. The children recite their lessons with a moderate level of fear because if they make a mistake, Uncle Willie will throw them at a pot-bellied stove. While they sometimes show open contempt for their situation, they do what they can to remain proud in the presence of outsiders, and especially whites. In an example of tragic irony, she considers his actions to be normal, even fatherly. One Easter Sunday, Maya is unable to finish reciting a poem in church, and self-consciously feeling ridiculed and a failure, Maya races from the church crying, laughing, and wetting herself.

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I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou: Summary

why the caged bird sings summary

The first and the third stanza shows the delight of the free bird experiencing freedom, whereas the rest of the stanzas concentrate on the plight of the caged bird. Angelou tells of how her grandmother's unfailing subservience around every white person angers her. Fourth Stanza The fourth stanza continues the parallel between the free bird and the caged bird. Maya decides that she has to get a job; she decides she can probably get a job on the streetcars, and becomes obsessed with the idea. Anyway, they make it to Stamps, Arkansas safely where their grandmother Momma and uncle Willie take them in. Maya is homeless, and decides to spend the evening in a junkyard car. Freeman sexually abuses and rapes Maya.


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I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Summary

why the caged bird sings summary

Flowers sends Maya home with books, expecting her to read them aloud. Stultified by television's all-too-predictable rhythms, the movie lacked the fire and spirit, warmth and sensibility that permeated her memoir and suffered from a trite ending. Marguerite spends much of her time observing the cotton pickers who arrive in the morning, and return later in the evening after their day's work is done. After the people leave, Willie retrieves it from behind an oil tank. Maya goes with Bailey to all the movies that the actress is in, and they think that it is their mother onscreen. It dips its wing in the sea of orange sunlight. The following passage indicates her observation: ''Then they would face another day of trying to earn enough for the whole year with the heavy knowledge that they were going to end the season as they started it.

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