Sunday, November 4, 2007
A brown Girl Dead
This poem I found to be simple and straight forward. I found the meaning to be expressive and compelling, as well as effective to the reader. The imagery to the color white expresses a sense of innocence. The two white roses upon her breasts, the white candles, and the white dress shows a girl who has been deprived of life. The only time she is able to be dressed up in this way is after life. This delivers a message to the reader that the family in which she belongs is poor and the color of white expresses a essence of purity. When thinking of the racial conflict during the time, it also delivers a sense that white is somewhat powerful and superior than dark. With dressing the child up in white, in essence the parents are trying to make her equal for her journey to the unknown.
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7 comments:
That is a really interesting point that you make about dressing the girl in white as a way of insinuating that white is superior to black. When I read this poem, I never thought of it that way. I initially thought of the white images as being representative of purity and innocence. The African American girl in the poem was young and never got to really experience life. However, I really like the way that you interpreted these white images. This brings a very different twist to the poem.
This poem was another one of my favorites because it was pretty straight forward and easy to understand. I like poems like this. I enjoyed reading your post and it brought a different prospective to this poem for me. I wasn't thinking about the after life, but I'm sure the mother was thinking about that a lot when she was having her daughter laid out. Maybe she was thinking that she wants her daughter to have something more special in the afterlife.
I enjoyed your interpretation of this particular poem. I agree that the color white in this poem resembles a sense of purity and innocence. I never thought about her being dressed in white as a build up for her journey into the "unknown," but I like how it sounds.
I didnt think about that. That's a really good point. To think that even through death they are trying to be white, to be equal, just to get into heaven is heartbreaking. I loved this poem too.
I also liked this poem becuase it was easy to read unlike the rest of cullen poems. You can definitly tell that this little girl is from a poor family and only time that she can be dressed up is on her way to after life. The white I thought was for purity but i can see how you saw it as innocence because the poem title the brown girl.
Yes, this poem was definitely packed with symbolism and I spent a lot of time trying to figure out just what was being communicated between the title of the poem and the color of her burial dress. You're idea that Cullen might be trying to say white is superior to black is interesting...I never thought about that, and I'm not sure whether I can totally agree or not. I feel like the poem is still basically based on the idea that this girl never got to have beautiful things in life, and that the most beautiful garment she ever got was post-mortem, additionally giving her a sense of purity.
I agree with courtney I also didn't take dressing the black girl up in white as signifying white is better. I felt that it was just a sense of purity and innocence and since she died do young she really could not experience life so in a way she is very innocent. I am not saying you are wrong but I feel that since everything we have read up to this point has in someway made the reader think that white is superior and better. So it is natural to assume that everyone is saying that and it may not even be the case.
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