Compare And Contrast Margaret Walker And For My People
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Democracy seeks to promote equality among the masses, harmony and justice, for the common good of the people. Every society and individual has his or her own vision of democracy, which is mostly dependent on the social, economic and cultural backgrounds of the people of that country or nation. Poets and writers express these ideas which are reflected in their works. Yet how do poets or literary works portray the vision for a society? Unlike political bureaucrats and leaders, how is the vision of the poet different from that of the vision of a political leader? This paper focuses on two different sets of poets, namely, Margaret walker, an African American poet and Walt Whitman, an American writer. Both the writers have written splendid pieces of works and have sought to inspire people with their poetry and most importantly their vision of how a…show more content… She starts the poem with the line, “For my people”, which is very simple, direct and clear. On the other hand, Whitman’s title of the poem has some ambiguity, in the sense that, by the first reading of the title, one cannot easily comprehend whether Whitman is referring metaphorically to a common goal or talking about some road in the literal sense. This creates a sense of anticipation in the minds of the readers and generates interest. It becomes very essential to understand the historical context and background for these poems in order to understand what the poets have to say. Margaret walker, as is seen is fully aware of her people’s social conditions and thus wishes to highlight their social problems and urges them the courage to be bold and strong. The structure of her poem is quite simple and in a layman’s language. She gives precedence to what she says rather than how she says, which is in sharp contrast with Whitman, who uses both language and style as an instrument to inspire the readers to think for