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Post 1: How Hayden recover what has been lost of the African-American experience
The historical foundation of Hayden’s poetry is based originally stemmed from the extensive study of the American and black history. In the “Middle Passage” the author mingles the voices of various speakers to depict the voyages of the slave traders that bring the Africans across the Atlantic Ocean (Lambert, 2014). Hayden was deeply moved by “Brown’s Body” and Hayden marked the passage in which Benet noted he could not explain the titanic battle according to the African-American viewpoint. The depiction from the poem Benet declared waited upon the black pen. Hayden uses the techniques of a collage of voice various mangled quotations borrowed from Eliot’s work but turns the implications in a different direction by suggesting that what transpired is the past and not present, which is fragmented (Lambert, 2014). Through the actions, Hayden recovers what has been lost as he views the past time when the tribal African powers lost their culture and humanity through slave trade. Through emphasizing the suffering and the countervailing force of the restoration, Hayden is capturing the African-American experience in the poem “Middle Passage.” The author recognizes that slavery has a tremendous amount of suffering. Hayden uses the poem as a means of communicating his aspect of the African-American experience “…A charnel Stench, effluvium of living death…where the living and the dead…lie foul with blood and excrement…” Hayden also tries to recover what is lost by the Africans in what seems like the slavery legacy (Lambert, 2014). The author indicates that the menace, slavery must be confronted. Hayden uses the words like “blood and excrement,” “living death,” and “stench.” The author affirms that there exists a painful psychological and historical state within the African-American experience (Lambert, 2014).
Part 2: the novel MAUS
Spiegelman demonstrates “…The death and subtlety that we have come to expect of traditional novels and extended nonfictional texts…” through various ways. The Jewish Holocaust perhaps depicts various events in which human spirit is engaged in a confrontational fight for survival (Chun, 2009). The work of Elie Wiesel called “Night” and Primo Levi’s “Survival in Auschwitz” represent the well known literary tradition. The MAUS represents the new kind of literary “oeuvre” based on the Holocaust. The MAUS fuses a story of the horrible historical happenings with the Jewish American struggle and forge his understanding of the brutal execution of his acquaintances by the Nazi rule. The genre is one of the fascinating in literature. The genre has positive qualities that are impressive, for instance, when the topic is complicated like the Holocaust. The MAUS is impressive nature to speak the unthinkable when using the phrase, “…a picture is worth a thousand words…” Spiegelman uses animal characters rather than human as Germans and the Jews are represented by cats and mice, respectively. The two animals are naturally known to be sworn enemies and lack conscience and reasoning. As the result, the cat finds no fault in the killing of the Jewish mice. The Holocaust demonstrates mans brutal nature. With this regard Spiegelman illustrates subtlety and death that is expected in the novel (Chun, 2009). The generation provides the greatest example of atrocities like the Second World War. During the period of unexplained brutality that the Nagasaki Bombing and Jewish Holocaust took place. The events are regarded in different light for the past half century. The events are analyzed divergently since mankind has had more than fifty years to think on its errors. The MAUS is not just a narrative of the Holocaust, but it also represents a story of human struggle and suffering, not only after a devastating like the concentration camp, but also later; not of one generation, but also the successive generations (Chun, 2009).
References
Chun, C. W. (2009). Critical Literacies and Graphic Novels for English‐Language Learners:
Teaching Maus. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 53(2), 144-153. Print.
Lambert, R. (2014). The Slave Trade as Memory and History: James A. Emanuel's" The Middle
Passage Blues" and Robert Hayden's" Middle Passage". African American Review, 47(2),
327-338. Print.
10 years ago