The Harlem Renaissance was a time period where African American culture flourished, both in the US and around the world. This increased interest in the arts led to the discovery of many new African American writers and poets, including Langston Hughes, Claud McKay, and Zora Neale Hurston. In his collection of works titled The New Negro, the cover of which is on the previous page, helped many promising African American writers gain recognition. Often times, these writers and poets drew on other aspects of the Harlem Renaissance when creating their work. Langston Hughes drew a lot of his inspiration from jazz music and many of his poems, including the passage from one of his poems on the previous page, follow the rhythm of jazz and blues music.
He wanted to tell the stories of his people in ways that reflected their actual culture, including both their suffering and their love of music, laughter, and language itself. In Hughes 's poetry, he uses the rhythms of African American music, particularly blues and jazz. This sets his poetry apart from that of other writers, and it allowed him to experiment with a very rhythmic free verse. Hughes 's second volume of poetry, Fine Clothes to the Jew (1927), was not received well at that time of its publication because it was too experimental. However, many critics believe the volume to be among Hughes 's greatest
For starters, the reader must be aware of historical events that had occurred and were occurring to understand the historical context of Candide. Prior to the Enlightenment in Voltaire’s time, the Reformation took place. The Reformation, often referred to as the Protestant Reformation, was a schism in Western Christianity that exposed the corruption in the church with the main goal to reform it. As a result, new revolutionary ideas about individualism and rationality materialized. Furthermore, the Enlightenment was born years later.
It was Luther, who published the ’95 Theses’ in 1517. Here he challenged the Pope’s authority and argued against corruption. This led to the Reformation, a break with the Roman Catholic Church and formation of the Protestant Church. The rediscovery of ancient texts and the invention of printing made learning much more available, and allowed the faster spread of ideas. Science and art were very strongly linked in the early years of the Renaissance, with people such as Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo being polymaths
Racism is a prominent issue or a serious problem in the American society since the beginning and the Americans are still struggling to eradicate this problem from their land. American soil has witnessed civil rights movements concerning this issue in the past. However in 1920, a movement got initiated to promote black identity known as Harlem Renaissance. It was also a fine arts movement that led to an increase in black confidence, literacy rate, and black culture. Writers wrote about their roots and the current society.
The New Negro Renaissance, more formally known as the Harlem Renaissance, earning it’s name from the 1925 anthology by Alain Locke, had many effects on many people, but it can be best described as a revolution, a cultural uprising where the high level of Black poetry, production and art demanded, and, in turn, received the mainstream appreciation and accolade which it rightly deserved. It is described as the most important and so discussed period in African American literacy, and indeed twentieth century literacy as a whole. Black poets felt segregating in their writing, and forced into the inforced, repressive form of the western white poets of the time. With their writing founded upon tribal, native songs full of pride and passion, the migration to a set form imposed upon them left a stale taste, a further example of how black people were repressed, not allowed to even express themselves in the form which they were used to, the form with which they grew up with. In his book, “The New Negro”, Alain Locke said that the writings of the Renaissance showed a “new spirit [..] awake in the black masses.” This spirit is that of “new Negro”, who has come to replace the “Old Negro” who “ had become more of a myth than a man.” (Locke) This spirit, spurred and cultivated by years of enslavement, both literal and, in a sense, figurative, is what led to the writings that are regarded part of a monumental era for black writing, and writing in general.
The Protestant Reformation was a time period of upheaval, conflict, and most importantly change and religious change being one the most significant changes. The Reformation had a huge impact on religion and the era shaped the understanding of Heaven and Hell. Martin Luther and John Calvin were main contributors to developing and creating religious ideals during this time. They were influential because Luther and Calvin both opposed the religious the traditional views of the time. The Catholic Church was being challenged for the first time during this time and altering the beliefs of people.
With the development of science, some theories of Darwin have become accepted facts. And in science the fact is the truth. [4] For hundreds of years, people’s minds were imprisoned by theology. However, Darwin’s theories had changed people’s way of knowing the world that with a scientific view to discover the world. In a sense, Darwin’s theory of evolution is a revolutionary breakthrough in natural
Finally, the modernist writer seemed to struggle to find meaning in the new world, and as in the case of Eliot, returning to Christian roots seemed to satisfy their pursuit. What is more, if writers, such as T. S. Eliot, had not broken free from traditional forms of writing and poetry, the literature of America would not have accurately reflected reality of the 20th century nor created an environment of greater liberty, social justice and human rights. Yet at the same time, high modernists helped usher in a less moralist society as well as a denigration of Christianity. Therefore, understanding current life circumstances of the modernists, such as T. S. Eliot, the methods used by modernist writers, and their impact on future writers, helps one gasp the deep and lasting impact the high modernist made on America and furthers understanding of modern
In France the advancement in scientific thought was limited by the Catholic hegemony over knowledge, while England on the other hand due to the laxing of policing mechanism provided the ideal space for progress in scientific thought. Religion which had played an important role in the advancement of science since the sixteenth century becomes ever more significant in the span of two decades from 1640 to 1660. The moderate Puritan reformers were now being challenged by a number of radical sectarian movements who saw in science the potential to bring about radical changes in the society. The moderate reformers who later established the Royal Society of Science in 1662, had to declare its goal of promoting an organized pursuit of experimental science in order to distance themselves from any attempt at radically reforming the church or the state. The threat of being deemed heretical loomed large over the puritan scientific reformers and they sought to divert it by coming up with the Christianized versions of upcoming scientific theories.