A Few Questions

This afternoon I'd like to add a few questions about Langston Hughes' poetry and the poetry we went over today.

-- Compare how Hughes depicts nature ("The Negro Speaks of Rivers") with the way that Whitman or Dickinson depicts nature.  What do these poems tell us about nature?  about changes in the American landscape from the 1800s to the 1900s?

-- As an African-American, how does Hughes relate to nature?

-- Discuss "Madam and her Madam" and "The Necklace" or "My Last Duchess" as poems by a male poet who assumes a woman's voice.

-- Discuss "Madam and her Madam" and "Crusoe in England" or "A narrow Fellow in the Grass" as poems by poets who assume the voice of the other gender.

-- Compare and contrast shorter poems like "I, Too," "The Negro Speaks of Rivers," "In Kyoto," "In a Station in the Metro," Emily Dickinson's poems, "Oread," and "The Red Wheelbarrow."  What are their strengths?  What are their weaknesses?  Are some poems really not that short?

-- Compare and contrast "In Kyoto" and "In a Station in the Metro."  How do both poems attract your attention?  How do they handle imagery?  How do they handle language?  How do they evoke emotion?  Do you think that Pound's poem is a kind of haiku?  Why?  Why not?

-- Many children study haiku and concrete poems in elementary school.  How does this affect the way that they view poetry?  Or these types of poems? 

--  Discuss Mary Ellen Solt as a female poet or woman writer.  (You may also bring in Jamaica Kincaid, Elizabeth Bishop, H.D., Gwendolyn Brooks, or Emily Dickinson.)  What does Solt add to women's writing?  How does she fall into gender stereotypes?

-- What does it mean to end our study of poetry with Mary Ellen Solt?  Why?  Consider how the unit would have ended with Langston Hughes, Jamaica Kincaid, or, our youngest poet, Abdul Ali.