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Pieces Like He Who Endures, And The Negro Speaks Of Rivers

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African American’s Long Fight for Freedom and Equality Throughout the history of the United States, African Americans have been discriminated against, abused, killed, and enslaved. Many pieces of African American literature touch on their experiences from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Movement and on to the current movement, Black Lives Matter. Pieces like He Who Endures, a play written by Bill Harris, and the poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” by Langston Hughes, are two examples. He Who Endures, set in the late 1840s to 1850s, mainly follows Frederick Douglass, John Brown, Henry Highland Garnet, and Shields Green, and their differing views on what steps the Abolitionists should take. The play ends with John Brown leading a group of men …show more content…

From, “I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep” to “I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it” (Hughes, 390), Africans and African Americans have a long history and culture in their home countries and continent. But, for centuries they were taken from their homes, beaten, tortured, killed, and raped all in the name of slavery. They had no rights and were only viewed as property. They were uneducated and sold off like cattle. The pain and blood of African Americans run deep in the history of the United …show more content…

The Civil War ended on May 9, 1865, with the victory of the Union; The north, the abolitionists, had prevailed and won. In the same year, the 13th Amendment was passed, solidifying the freedom of African American slaves. In Langston Hughes’ poem, “I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset” (Hughes, 390). The Mississippi River runs through the center of the United States, from the north to the south. The “muddy bosom” that the south once was, turned golden when African American slaves were finally freed by the 13th Amendment– which Abe Lincoln pushed to ratify. In this line from ‘The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” Langston Hughes speaks of that very

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