Essay on Hardships Expressed in Hughes On the Road and Mother to Son

Hardships Expressed in Hughes On the Road and Mother to Son African-American citizens who live in the United States have experienced a tough life through personal experiences. They have struggled to obtain basic civil rights--a struggle that has spanned many centuries (Mabunda 311). Langston Hughes, author of the short story "On the Road" and the poem "Mother to Son," often illustrated in his writing the hardships experienced by the characters--products of African American life in the United States. While Hughes and other young African-American authors wanted to define and celebrate black art and culture, they were also responsible for changing the preconceived notions of most Americans' erroneous ideas of black life (Mabunda 696). The cultural aspects of Hughes' poems exhibited life as an African-American in the late 1910s to the early 1960s. His views, like many writers in his era, came directly from personal experience, which provided the reader with a sense of communication that illustrated--with art rather than essay--the ills of the racist world. L. Mpho Mabunda proclaims that the issues and grim realities of the African-American "could be experienced through the lives of characters and in verse, and the message delivered more subtly and effectively" (696) . The overall theme and purpose of "On the Road" and "Mother to Son" are centered around an illustration of the hardships experienced by most African-American citizens in the early part of the century. Both genres graphically detail the lifestyle and environment in which the African-American lived. In the 20th century, many of the black communities in America have existed in a perpetual state of crisis ("Black American"). According to Kenneth Clark in his add... ... Robinson. The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States. New York: Arno P, 1968. "Henry McNeal Turner." Online. Internet. 24 Apr. 1998. Hughes, Langston. "Mother to Son." Bridges: Literature across Cultures. Eds. Gilbert H. Muller and John A. Williams. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1994. 52. ---. "On the Road." Bridges: Literature across Cultures. Eds. Gilbert H. Muller and John A.Williams. New York: McGRaw-Hill, 1994. 845-8. Mabunda, L. Mpho, ed. The African American Almanac. 7th ed. Detroit, MI: Gale Research Inc., 1997. Miller, R. Baxter, and Evelyn Nettles. "Langston Hughes." Concise Dictionary of American Literary Biography: The Age of Maturity, 1929-1941. Detroit,  Ã‚  Ã‚   MI: Gale Research Inc., 1989. 150-71. Quarles, Benjamin. The Negro in the Making of America. London: Collier-Macmillan Ltd., 1969.