We are given two poems “Johannesburg” and “City Johannesburg”, at first glance, one wonders if there is really any difference between the poems. After all, both have the word “Johannesburg” in the title. On closer inspection, we find that there is indeed quite a few differences but also similarities as well. The poets have made use of imagery effectively throughout the poem, one crucial image that arises from both poems is that of racism. There is other imagery used further emphasising the issues that arose during the Apartheid Era. William Plomer’s poem “Johannesburg” is of the lives of men who worked and ‘lived’ in Johannesburg during the gold rush in “eighty-five”. It is from the rich man’s perspective. They have all the “fortunes” which was “founded overnight”, thus leading to urbanisation and so “mansions rose among the rocks.” This urbanisation lead to the men which were migrant workers having “girls” while working. These men cheated on their wives and these women were referred to as “girls” and so were around in the cities and mingled and had sexual relations with these men. Money was so abundant to these men that “champagne baths” that “sluiced their skins”. Showing …show more content…
Once he gets onto the bus to go to “Johannesburg” he leaves behind all he loves, all that is dear to him, that defines him, his place of birth, and ultimately the place where he will be laid rest. “Johannesburg” will be the reason for his “death”, he knows it well so well that it is as if it was something he came into contact with daily, just like we the “wink to the eye”. The “bus” leaves behind “whirling dust” this is unsettling just like the poets life, it is back and forth daily. Whilst traveling to “Johannesburg” on the “black and white” which emphasises the racisms that took place in that era then “roboted roads” brings alliteration of the ‘r’ sound further emphasising the point of
The metaphoric language is used to compare the blacks and the whites trying to live
He implements that his curse fades away unnoticed, and that his word has no significance. His thoughts switch to his struggle. The use of the diesel truck shows that this truck is big. The size of the truck is big enough to give the speaker of the poem a sense of nervousness as he passes it. The curse (poem words) passes around on the road is representative of his state of thoughts, in which something can seem so significant but fade away into the unseen distance before it gains any more significance.
1. Explain the author's primary point. The author seeks to bring to light the unfair treatment of the Negros by the whites in the places they live in. He also seeks to show that leaders only make empty promises to their people. Brutal cases are most among the Negros as they are attacked and their cases go unnoticed or ignored.
The famous English poet Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “Speech is power: speech is to persuade, to convert, to compel. It is to bring another out of his bad sense into your good sense”. Although voice is undoubtedly one of the most powerful and versatile assets humans possess, simply having a good voice does not ensure power. This idea is well illustrated in Alan Paton’s Cry the Beloved Country where Paton creates characters that have powerful voices but lack other essential qualities necessary to become powerful leaders. Set in a time where racial tensions between the blacks and the whites are at their highest, Africa is in desperate need of a gifted leader who can step up and guide the people to glory.
For example in the “Back Road” the meaning of the drive is to take it easy, and slow down so you can enjoy and experience things in life. The author tells you this when he says, “ Sam hated rushing things and insisted they take the back road… This was a decidedly relaxed ride… That’s why these back roads are so great, Sam said. You get to see all these things.”
204). The art showed off their love and passion for their culture and the fearlessness they possessed with the challenges they’ve faced daily. The upper and middle classes of the black community could only relate to the white community by denying their tie to the lower class (Huggins, p. 204). The difference is, the lower class wasn’t so effected by the shame, they loved every part of their poor, loud, and acentric lives.
This setting affects the reader’s perception of this poem by using the cars’ hot metallic bodies and the full force of a hot, summer day to entice the reader to enter this steaming bygone era of cars and lust. The cars are symbolic of a black society that has been
In Booker T. Washington’s, “A Protest Against the Burning and Lynching of Negroes”, he inspects racial injustice through pathos and logos. Firstly, Washington gives a pathos statement by expressing his views on the unreasonable burning and lynching. “These brutal and inhuman crimes are leading us,”(Washington 1904). Furthermore, they happened regularly and were insane therefore he showed his emotions towards them.
There are many lessons throughout the novel that could be taught and learned in our world, this society, today. They may be true; however, the reasons the lessons are taught in the first place is because of the society being presented in this literary work, The Road. This gives the sociological approach a more appropriate understanding approach to the road. The society and the characters can be analyzed thoroughly and effectively this way. “When your dreams are of some world that never was or of some world that will never be and you are happy again then you have given up.
In the poem, “The Road Not Taken,” Robert Frost uses beautifully crafted metaphors, imagery, and tone to convey a theme that all people are presented with choices in life, some of which are life-altering, so one should heavily way the options in order to make the best choices possible. Frost uses metaphors to develop the theme that life 's journey sometimes presents difficult choices, and the future is many times determined by these choices. Throughout the poem, Frost uses these metaphors to illustrate life 's path and the fork in the road to represent an opportunity to make a choice. One of the most salient metaphors in the poem is the fork in the road. Frost describes the split as, “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry I could not travel both (“The Road Not Taken,” lines 1-2).
Africa in this novella is portrayed as “the Heart of Darkness” the place where the men’s inner evil is exposed, this is done through their thoughts and actions. The contrast between the Thames River and the Congo River is also made evident in the novella. The Thames River is described as calm and peaceful. It is viewed as a city of light that is not mysterious.
People do not view Africa as a great world power due to its history of slaves and poverty. Africa will become a great nation like it was before the peace broken by European powers. Africa will return to its natural roots being free from violence and discrimination. The poem, Africa, relates to the harass of Africans and African-Americans being seen as a lower class even in modern time. This poem repeats in America with black injustice crimes, ripping black culture to modernized.
The poem Christmas Carol by DJ Opperman was originally an Afrikaans poem. It was translated in to English by Anthony Delius. The fact that they went through all the trouble to translate it from Afrikaans to English, shows the significance of the poem for South African History. The poem takes the biblical story of the birth of Jesus and relocates it to District Six and the birth of a small brown child. In this essay I will discuss what function place has on the setting and the language used in this poem in order to help us understand what the relevance and significance of this poem has as a social commentary on the racial and cultural division that still continues in South African even two decades after Apartheid had ended.
Book review – Boyhood The novel ‘’ boyhood ‘’ (1997) is written by the author J.M. Coetzee and is about a young boy and his childhood in South Africa in the town Worcester. The boy in the book is the author Coetzee and his life between the age 10 to age 13 and his way to adjust to the society and to find himself as a person. The book describes the love and the hate that Coetzee has for his mother, and the shame that he feels for his father combined with the isolation from his classmates. Boyhood is not only about Coetzee himself but also about South Africa and the apartheid.
This essay will discuss the elements of fiction found in the novel “Welcome to our Hillbrow” by Pheswane Mpe. Through the author’s intelligent honesty in exploring thematic apprehensions relevant to post-apartheid South African society, one may suggest that the main theme of the novel is the reflection of old and new sets of problems facing South Africa. The essay will specifically discuss how characterisation and narration contribute to other small themes like crime, Aids, xenophobia and suicide that make up to the main theme of post-apartheid issues that the new and democratic South Africa is currently facing and it will also explain what is meant by the term microcosm. The essay is aimed at making a link between the elements of fiction found in the novel and the theme and also explaining the