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Justin Chow Tsun Ho
Assignment #1
Poem: Dream Variation
Observation: Annotation in text.
Questions:
1) Why there were daytime and nighttime?
- I think the author was trying to use the daytime as a metaphor for white people
and nighttime for black people. Words like “Dance with sunlight”, “Rest in
evening dark like me”
2) Why the author wanted to dance during daytime?
- I think the author wished to live in a society without color persecution and racial
discrimination. He wanted to have rights of freedom during the daytime where
equality and human rights exists.
3) Was there a relationship between two stanzas?
- Yes. The first stanza described the poet’s dream. The second stanza went back to
the reality as he rested at a tree that was less comfort than the first stanza after a
day of work. “That’s my dream” -> move on to reality
4) What was the dream the author mentioned in his poem?
- I guess the dream of author was to live in a place that is far away from the city.
The place has total equality and respect to all human kinds. The author will have
freedom to do what he wants and rest in the evening peacefully.
Summary Analysis:
The poem has two stanzas. The first one was with 9 lines and the second one with 8 lines.
The title was named “Dream Variation” because the author thought that the dream he had was
different from the reality. The author wished to live in a society without color persecution and
racial discrimination. However in reality the place where he lived in wasn’t reflecting the dream.
He could not shine and dance during daytime when the white people were the dominant group.
He also couldn’t have a comfort place to rest in as he wished in his dream due to lack of human
rights. That’s where the dream varies from reality.
Essay: “The Art of the Ancestors” & “Heritage” by Countee Cullen
Observation: Annotation in text.
Questions:
1) Why the primitive African wood and bronze sculpture has such representation?
- I think it was because their aesthetic work has gain a lot attention from European
countries and they admire the quality of the art piece made by the African.
2) Why Negro is not a cultural foundling without an inheritance?
- I think that was due to the art pieces of wood and sculpture they had developed
in early ages were discovered. The powerful simplicity of conception and
originality of expression was admired by variety of artist from Europe. This
evidence has switched the Africans from burly unknown cultures to the master of
music, dance, and poetry. They became “The Ancestors of Art.”
3) Why Cullen repeat the question “What is Africa to me ?”
- I think the author was confused about his culture and his identity of being an
African living in the United States.
4) Why the author thought that Africa was just a book one thumbs?
- I think the person who wrote this has a feeling of not knowing his ancestries
from his race. He could only imagine his homeland by reading the booking and
dream about it.
Summary Analysis:
The Art of the Ancestors was writing about how the collection of African art has changed
the perspective on how people view their culture before the discovery of the woods and sculpture.
The huge impacts on artist from all around the world have proven that the art pieces from the
Negro were the fundamental bases of the African culture. The powerful simplicity of conception,
design and effect was the best evidence of an aesthetic endowment of the art work. It also made
the culture of the Negro became the ancestor of art with inheritance and respect.
The poetry Heritage was written by a man that was confused about his identity and
feeling loss about his own race’s history. By living in the United States, he was not able to
retrieve a lot of information from his ancestors as his mentioned three centuries of slavery has
whipped the rights of his race to develop its history. All he could do was to read books and
images from dream to learn about his homeland. He's never been there, that was the reason why
he's questioning what Africa means to him and his life. There was a different religion or image
of God from Africa to White in his mindset, and America has no ancestral meaning to him. He
was lost about what kind of African he was.
Fiction: “Carma” by Jean Toomer
Observation: Annotation in text.
Questions:
1) Where is the cane field or town?
- I think the story was located in Guinea, a country in West Africa as it was
mentioned in the poem. “Scratching choruses above the guinea’s squawk”
2) Why Carma ran off the house and drove the cane bike?
- I think it was because Carma’s husband Bane heard about the rumors in town
that her wife has been unfaithful to him. When Bane accused her and they argue,
she ran away with anger.
3) What does the “gang” mean?
- I think the gang means that his husband was put into prison after killing his
neighbor. His husband joined the gang because of her wife. The gang could mean
the prison.
4) Why her husband had to kill someone?
- I think it was because he was frustrated because of his work, and he thought her
wife was not loyal to him, and yet her wife fooled him with the injury. He was
mad and decided to kill somebody to calm himself down. That is the reason why
he ended up in the prison.
Summary Analysis:
The story happened in a country named Guinea in West Africa. A man called Bane was
contractors that always work away from town. He heard about rumors from his neighbors that
her wife Carma was not faithful to him. A conflict between the arguments of the couple led to a
tragedy. Her wife took a gun and ran out to the canfield in town. Bane did not plan to chase her
back until he heard gunfire. He gathered the neighbors in town and searched for her. She turned
out to be fine and Bane was mad about it. He was mad about her deception and fooled him. He
couldn’t control his temper and murder a man. He joined the gang, which was the prison. It was
a melodrama to me.