StudentShare
Contact Us
Sign In / Sign Up for FREE
Search
Go to advanced search...
Free

The Speaker's Attitude Towards the Subject Matter of White Lies Poem - Essay Example

Cite this document
Summary
"The Speaker's Attitude Towards the Subject Matter of White Lies Poem" paper focuses on a poem whose speaker is a child of mixed race. She could easily lie to the white folks about where they lived because she was constantly haunted by the issue of racism. …
Download full paper File format: .doc, available for editing
GRAB THE BEST PAPER94.4% of users find it useful
The Speakers Attitude Towards the Subject Matter of White Lies Poem
Read Text Preview

Extract of sample "The Speaker's Attitude Towards the Subject Matter of White Lies Poem"

The poet is confused and bitter over the issue, for she can tell others she is white, and that they lived in a better place, and still manage away with it. Her classmates assume that she Is white, as the classmate does when she holds her hand in an act of unity. she is though sad but optimistic in life. (Trethewey, Natasha) Trethewey has used color imagery in the poem constantly, especially in the first stanza.

The poet mentions six colors, which are all different, and all describe the lies. "light-bright, near-white, high-yellow, red-boned, white, and black." It is an African American speaker who could lie frequently, though the lies did not mean anything much. She would lie about where she lived, and where she bought her clothes, "uptown .. homemade dresses came out the window of Maison blande," but would also lie about being African American. She did pass easily for being white. It's sad the way she describes lying about her skin color.

She writes, "I could even keep quiet, quiet as kept, like the time a white girl said "squeezing my hand, Now we have three of us in this class." It is sad because she is lying to be part of the group. She writes "squeezing my hand," brings the sense that she only lied because she was amazed by the way the girl was behaving as a good friend. The first stanza does describe her as light-skinned for an African American. It says, "I was growing up/light-bright, near-white/high-yellow, red-boned/in a black place.

" The words "light-bright" and "near-white" make me think of a very light color. (Trethewey, Natasha) The color white also has a double meaning here because, while white is connected throughout the poem to lies, at the end of the poem it is connected to soap that will purify someone. The speaker says in stanza three, "She laid her hands on me, then washed out my mouth with Ivory soap. This was to purify, she said, and cleanse your lying tongue." White is described as the right thing here according to the speaker.

She does it also in stanza two when she says, "I could act like my homemade dresses come straight out of the window at Maison Blanche." This phrase would make us think that only dresses from the "White House" were better than any other from other places. (Trethewey, Natasha) I can therefore conclude and say that, the speaker perceives white as the best for everything in life. white Clothes from the white house were good for her, she knew minds are purer only with white soap, and nothing was more pretty than white lies.

The speaker's mother was not for the idea of pretending to be white while her daughter was not, she wanted to be identified as black, for according to her nothing was so good with the whites. The tone is sad, and we could sympathize with the speaker because it was all because of what the blacks and the mixed races had to go through in a locality full of racism and segregation. Natasha wrote passionately about human sufferings and vivid history because his idea and the poem can be compared to other poems like Domestic Work, Flounder, and even Letter Home.

They all explore the theme of blacks' sufferings, and how this racism haunted them constantly wherever they walked and whenever they found themselves in the middle of some whites. Natasha's poetic license was all aimed at asking us one big question: can we do away with history because it had much to remind the people of where they came from or where they were going? 

Read More
Cite this document
  • APA
  • MLA
  • CHICAGO
(“Analyze white lies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words”, n.d.)
Retrieved from https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1534230-analyze-white-lies
(Analyze White Lies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 Words)
https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1534230-analyze-white-lies.
“Analyze White Lies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 Words”, n.d. https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1534230-analyze-white-lies.
  • Cited: 0 times

CHECK THESE SAMPLES OF The Speaker's Attitude Towards the Subject Matter of White Lies Poem

Analysis of Three Poems

The Sound of Silence Garfunkel's poem, 'The Sound of Silence,' illustrates a moment of awakening for the speaker.... In a broad sense, this poem invites the readers to examine their own lives in order to redeem themselves from systems of darkness, which systematically prevent them from the pleasures and joy of reality.... This poem is a mockery of the modern discourse of communication and human existence, which has eroded the natural sense of humanity....
7 Pages (1750 words) Essay

To His Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell and the Flea by John Donne

The author states that the irony in both poems is that though the speaker's main concern is to get his beloved into bed with him, he takes a long-winding way to try to reach his destination, fulfillment of carnal desire.... John Donne's 'The Flea' is a three-stanza poem, each stanza having nine lines.... Andrew Marvell's poem 'To His Coy Mistress' has three stanzas too.... As the reader can see, Andrew Marvell's poem 'To His Coy Mistress' is in three stanzas, and the mood, too, changes....
6 Pages (1500 words) Research Paper

Death in Poetry

In the poem "Between Earth and Sky", the speaker exposes some of the loss he feels as he begins to lose his mother.... The paper "Death in Poetry" highlights that generally speaking, through both of the poems, it is possible to see that McIntosh is a master at layering meaning within his work, smoothly transitioning through the various orders of the unconscious mind....
7 Pages (1750 words) Essay

Close Reading Response to Poems that Describe Robert Herricks Devotion to Ben Jonson

is of high essence that he occurs to necessitate reminding the maidens of the grave consequence of regret so that it should not matter whether they unknowingly spend time in the hands of misfortune, for great and worst moments alike each amount to a time fully utilized.... In the light of understanding the depth of ties between Robert Herrick and Ben Jonson and the profound devotion which the former is well noted for toward the latter, it would serve as an appropriate aid to examine the period in history and the state of society in which these two remarkable poets lived and confronted their colorful fates....
8 Pages (2000 words) Essay

William Wordsworths Poem in The Speaker of the Prelude by Mark Reed

The author of the paper will begin with the statement that in his article entitled 'The Speaker of the Prelude,' author Mark Reed argues that the seemingly piecemeal compilation of William Wordsworth's lengthy poem The Prelude is an integral aspect of the work.... The poem has long been a source of intense study by scholars because of its unsure status as a stand-alone piece or as a portion of a larger and uncompleted whole.... Throughout the work, Wordsworth changes tone, voice, tense and subject frequently, making any attempts to treat the poem as a work in and of itself nearly impossible....
5 Pages (1250 words) Article

Robert Frost and Romanticism

Many Frost poems take place in nature, talk about nature or natural elements, and always the speakers of the poem demonstrate an awe and reverence for the natural world.... This research paper discusses the connections between Robert Frost, who was a poet and romanticism poetic style, that aims readers to imagine the world as it should be, an idealist place with mystical components that reveal a more personal perspective....
10 Pages (2500 words) Research Paper

The Poem the Fish

The poet's attitude towards the fish also shifts.... In 'white lies' Trethewey relies on her experiences as an interracial child passing for Caucasian in a racially charged environment.... All these depend on the underlying subject matter.... poet assumes different personas depending on the subject of the poem.... The paper "The poem the Fish" states that words and phrases that convey striking images make up most of the poem 'The Fish'....
2 Pages (500 words) Assignment

Narcissism and Misogyny in Shakespeare's Sonnets

Throughout the sequence, each attempt of resolving the contradictions or determining a fixed perspective is inevitably frustrated as every individual poem keeps shifting to different points of view, or suddenly succeeded by other sonnets which splinter that perspective.... This term paper "Narcissism and Misogyny in Shakespeare's Sonnets" examines poems with reference to narcissism, misogyny, as well as their depictions....
15 Pages (3750 words) Term Paper
sponsored ads
We use cookies to create the best experience for you. Keep on browsing if you are OK with that, or find out how to manage cookies.
Contact Us