"Sympathy" (1899)

I know what the caged bird feels.
Ah me, when the sun is bright on the upland slopes,
when the wind blows soft through the springing grass
and the river floats like a sheet of glass,
when the first bird sings and the first bud ops,
and the faint perfume from its chalice steals.
I know what the caged bird feels.

I know why the caged bird beats his wing
till its blood is red on the cruel bars,
for he must fly back to his perch and cling
when he fain would be on the bow aswing.
And the blood still throbs in the old, old scars
and they pulse again with a keener sting.
I know why he beats his wing.

I know why the caged bird sings.
Ah, me, when its wings are bruised and its bosom sore.
It beats its bars and would be free.
It's not a carol of joy or glee,
but a prayer that it sends from its heart's deep core,
a plea that upward to heaven it flings.
I know why the caged bird sings.

 

 Primary Works:

Oak and Ivy, 1893; Majors and Minors, 1896; Lyrics of Lowly Life, 1896; Folks from Dixie, 1898; The Uncalled, 1898; Lyrics of the Hearthside, 1899; The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories, 1900; The Fanatics, 1901; The Sport of the Gods, 1902; Lyrics of Love and Laughter, 1903; In Old Plantation Days, 1903; The Heart of Happy Hollow, 1904; Lyrics of Sunshine and Shadow, 1905.

| Top | Achievement:

Praised as "the first American Negro poet of real literary distinction," by James Weldon Johnson, and the "poet laureate of the Negro Race" by Mary Church Terrrel, Paul Laurence Dunbar was enormously popular as a writer within his lifetime. He wrote novels and short stories, but his reputation is based on a sizable body of poetry presented in the 'dialect" of southern Blacks. Some critics have accused him of portraying negative stereotypes to satisfy a White reading public. One is reminded, in Dunbar's situation, of the concept of "twoness" discussed by W. E. B. Du Bois. When a writer is Black and the publishers and readers White, consideration should be given to the issue of "why" Dunbar, and Phillis Wheatley, and others, wrote as they did. William Dean Howells's review of Dunbar's poems has influenced much of Dunbar's critical reception. He suggested that Dunbar's poems should be divided in two groups: literary and dialect. Unfortunately he favored the dialect poems as being more authentic and exotic. Appreciation of Dunbar's literary achievements began in the second half of this century.

| Top | Selected Bibliography: Books

Alexander, Eleanor. Lyrics of Sunshine and Shadow: The Tragic Courtship and Marriage of PLD and Alice Ruth Moore, A History of Love and Violence among the African American Elite. NY: New York UP, 2001.

Braxton, Joanne M., ed. The Collected Poetry of PLD. Charlottesville: UP of Virginia, 1993. PS1556 .A1

Dunbar, Paul Laurence. The Complete Poems of PLD, with the introduction to "Lyrics of Lovely Life" by W. D. Howells. NY, Dodd, 1967. PS1556 .A1

Gayle, Addison, Jr. Oak and Ivy: A Biography of PLD. Garden City, N.J.: Doubleday, 1971.

Martin, Jay. ed. A Singer in the Dawn : Reinterpretations of PLD. NY: Dodd, 1975. PS1557 C44

Revell, Peter. Paul Laurence Dunbar. Boston Twayne, 1979. PS1557 .R4

| Top | Selected Bibliography: Articles

Allen, Caffilene. "The Caged Bird Sings: The Ellison-Dunbar Connection." College Language Association Journal. 40.2 (1996): 178-90.

Bausch, Susan. "Inevitable or Remediable? The Historical Connection between Slavery, Racism, and Urban Degradation in Paul Laurence Dunbar's The Sport of the Gods." CLA Journal. 45.4 (2002): 497-522.

Best, Felton O. "PLD's Protest Literature: The Final Years." Western Journal of Black Studies. 17.1 (1993): 54-63.

DeSantis, Christopher C. "The Dangerous Marrow of Southern Tradition: Charles W. Chesnutt, PLD, and the Paternalist Ethos at the Turn of the Century." Southern Quarterly: A Journal of Arts in the South. 38.2 (2000): 79-97.

Inge, Casey. "Family Functions: Disciplinary Discourses and (De)Constructions of the 'Family' in The Sport of the Gods." Callaloo. 20.1 (1997): 226-42.

Keeling, John. "Paul Dunbar and the Mask of Dialect." Southern Literary Journal. 25.2 (1993): 24-38.

Ramsey, William M. "Dunbar's Dixie." Southern Literary Journal. 32.1 (1999): 30-45. 

| Top | Study Questions

For "Mr. Cornelius Johnson, Office-Seeker":

1. What did the Reconstruction Amendments to the U.S. Constitution (1865-70) accomplish? What did they fail to do?

2. Given the method of character presentation, do you--as the reader--sympathize with Cornelius Johnson? Do you find any weaknesses in him that might tend to explain his predicament?

For Dunbar's poetry:

1. By "scanning" Dunbar's poetry, does a reader learn anything about Dunbar's poetic technique?

2. Analyze Dunbar's representation of black southern life in "When Malindy Sings" and "An Ante-Bellum Sermon." In particular, consider the tactics he utilizes in attempting to undermine the stereotypes that his characterizations appear on the surface to endorse. How successful are these tactics? Examine the role of religion and the use of irony in both poems.

3. From your knowledge of Frederick Douglass, does Dunbar's poem entitled "Frederick Douglass" transmit important information about the nineteenth-century leader?

MLA Style Citation of this Web Page

Reuben, Paul P. "Chapter 6: Late Nineteenth Century - Paul Laurence Dunbar." PAL: Perspectives in American Literature- A Research and Reference Guide. URL:http://www.csustan.edu/english/reuben/pal/chap6/dunbar.html (provide page date or date of your login).   

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