Influences On Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou was influenced by writers from all walks of life. The authors that influenced Angelou's writing are discussed in the essays, "Mary Jane Lupton on the Poets Who Influenced Maya Angelou," by Mary Jane Lupton, and "Dolly A. McPherson On Angelou's Use Of Comic Irony," by Dolly McPherson. Maya Angelou's comic ironies and self parodies were influenced by writers from all backgrounds and races including whites, Africans, and Asians. "[These writers] influenced the way [Angelou] wrote, thought, and imagined."

(TS)In "Mary Jane Lupton on the Poets Who Influenced Maya Angelou," Lupton discusses the different types of writers who influenced Maya Angelou's writings. (SD)Maya Angelou was influenced by white women poets such as Emily Dickinson when she was younger. (CM)She was also intrigued by black women writers such as Georgia Douglas Johnson, Francis Harper, and Anne Spencer. (CM) Other writers who influenced her writing later on were black women such as Georgia Douglas Johnson, Francis Harper, Anne Spencer, William Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe, James Weldon Johnson, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Dorothy Parker. (SD)Angelou enjoyed the passion of Millay's writing and the sarcastic humor of Parker's writing. (CM)In reference to their writings, Maya Angelou remarks, "I'm rarely wry. I think I'm funny. I love to be funny." (CM)Maya Angelou compares her comedic writing to that of Dorothy Parker and her own passion to the writing of Edna St. Vincent Millay. (SD)Angelou used Georgia Douglas Johnson's lyric "The Heart of a Woman" as the title to her fourth autobiography. (CM)Her autobiographies explain her journey in Asian, African, and African American literature. (CM)Angelou states about autobiographers, "So I think we're all on journeys, according to how we're able to travel, overcome, undercome, and share what we have learned." (CS)Maya Angelou was intrigued by varities of writing from all over the world.

(TS)"Dolly A. McPherson on Angelou's Use of Comic Irony," explains how Maya Angelou's writing is sensitive, poised, humorous, realisitic, and empathetic. (SD)Dolly A. McPherson explains that black autobiographers often write with humor and irony when describing painful experiences. (CM) Maya Angelou uses this same comic irony in her writing to keep with this tradition. (CM)Angelou often uses comic irony in her writing to describe her relationships with other people. (SD) Maya Angelou also successfully uses self parody in her writing, which was new to black autobiographies. (CM)McPherson states, "Angelou reveals her youthful silliness, her loneliness, her pretensions, her aspirations, and her instability," particularly in the first four volumes of her autobiography. (CM)McPherson says that Maya Angelou used these themes in her writing to reveal her character and personality as she matured into adulthood. (SD)Maya Angelou's comic irony is not only huumorous for the sake of laughter, but also for the sake of reality and truth. (CM)McPherson says about Angelou's writing, "Behind the laughter is a vision of human weakness, an empathy for people's foibles and their efforts to retain some semblance of dignity in the midst of the ridiculous." (CM)Maya Angelou writes realistically of the need for a tension between stability and instability.(CS)In Maya Angelou's writings, an understanding of self is represented and excellently portrayed through the use of comic irony and self-parody.

Maya Angelou creatively uses her influences from other writers with comic irony. "Mary Jane Lupton on the Poets Who Influenced Maya Angelou," by Mary Jane Lupton, and "Dolly A. McPherson On Angelou's Use Of Comic Irony," by Dolly McPherson are essays that explain the roots of Maya Angelou's writing and ideas. Maya Angelou was intrigued by writers from around the world. The variety of Maya Angelou's writing influences allow for effectiveness in her self parodies and comic ironies.



Works Cited
Lupton, Mary Jane, and Harold Bloom. “Mary Jane Lupton on the Poets Who Influenced Maya Angelou”
Bloom’s Major Poets: Maya Angelou (2001): 30-31. InfoBase Publishing.
EBSCOhost. Three Rivers Community College Library. 11 October 2010
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McPherson, Dolly A. “Dolly A. McPherson on Angelou’s Use of Comic Irony.”
Bloom’s Guides: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (2004): 69-71. InfoBase Publishing. EBSCOhost. Three Rivers Community College Library. 11 October 2010 .

Choices

America is called “The Land of the Free” because of the freedom Americans have to make choices. People make choices by behaving in ways that are in harmony with their personal ideals. Both important and everyday decisions have the capability of changing a person’s entire life; therefore, it is important to think responsibly and make wise decisions. There is a common thread regarding important and personal choices in the three essays, “What We Eat,” by Eric Schlosser, “The Boston Photographs,” by Nora Ephron, and “Life Size,” by Jenefer Shute.

The first essay, “What We Eat,” by Eric Schlosser, is about the fast-food industries’ influential grip on American society. Americans have developed poor eating habits as a direct result of fast-food culture. Convenience, affordability, and familiarity of fast-food are the main reasons why Americans choose to eat at restaurants such as McDonald’s. The McDonald’s franchise has grown into an empire because of the company’s success in supplying Americans with food that fits a busy lifestyle. Schlosser states, “The extraordinary growth of the fast-food industry has been driven by fundamental changes in American society.” Schlosser claims that fast-food became especially popular as women entered the workforce-a time when the American lifestyle encountered a dramatic change. The decision American women made to enter the workforce increased fast-food’s popularity because women had less time to prepare traditional meals while having a job, and fast-food is an easy and cheap way to feed a family. The uniformity of fast-food and fast-food restaurants is also a key part in the success of a fast-food franchise. Most Americans are comfortable with fast-food restaurants like McDonald’s, because the menu and the services will be almost exactly the same in any one of its locations. Americans choose large restaurant chains with recognizable food and service over smaller restaurant companies out of comfort and familiarity. Fast-food industries will continue to grow and prosper because Americans prefer convenience, affordability, and familiarity of their food and food services.

The second essay, “The Boston Photographs,” by Nora Ephron, is about a set of photographs taken of a woman falling to her death along with a child and a firefighter. The pictures were featured in over four hundred magazines across the United States alone, and these papers received an enormous amount of negative feedback from readers. The readers felt that the newspapers did not have the right to publish the photos, as they were personal and morbid, and they felt that the newspapers merely chose to use the disturbing photos as a way to sell more papers. The Post’s editor, Charles Seib wrote: “Any editor who decided to print those pictures without at least a moment’s thought to what the purpose they served and what their affect was likely to be on the reader should ask another question: have I become so preoccupied with manufacturing a product according to professional standards that I have forgotten about the consumer, the reader?” Nora Ephron stated that she disagreed with Seib's statement, because she thought that the pictures were published justifiably. Nora Ephron “[recognizes] that printing pictures of corpses raises all sorts of problems about taste and titillation and sensationalism; the fact is, however, that people die. Death happens to be one of life’s main events. And it is irresponsible-and more than that, inaccurate-for newspapers to fail to show it…” Ephron believes the papers were justified in publishing the photos because death is inevitable and the topic should not be avoided. The newspaper publishers chose to release the pictures not only for selling purposes, but also for factual reasons. Another reason why the newspapers published the pictures they are powerful and cause a reaction, which is the point of any good photograph. Nora Ephron says, “That they disturb readers is exactly as it should be: that’s why photojournalism is often more powerful than written journalism.” The newspaper publishers made a conscious choice to feature the pictures; whether or not readers agreed with the morality of them, they served their purpose to make readers feel a certain way.

“Life Size,” by Jennifer Shute is a fictional essay about a girl named Josie who is in the hospital with anorexia. Josie is extremely thin and frail because of her decision to starve herself. While she is in the hospital, she hides the food she is offered and doesn’t eat any of it, except for little bites so she won’t get in trouble with the nurse. Josie is always aware of the calories and fats in food, and makes excuses for herself and to the nurse to justify her not eating. The way she thinks is unusual compared to a normal human’s thoughts, especially on the topics of food and of control. Josie uses starvation as a way to control her body, and she thinks she has strong will power because she keeps herself from eating, and persuades herself that she is not hungry. Josie thinks, “For me, food’s only interest lies in how little I need, how strong I am, how well I can resist-each time achieving another small victory of the will.” The nurse offers Josie a menu card so that she has the control to choose what types of food she is given. When Josie is brought a salad and a roll that she hides, the nurse comes back in to check on her a half an hour later, only to find that Josie hid the food in her drawer. Josie says to herself, “What choice do I have, powerless as a child, forced to lie and scheme simply to exercise the elementary-the alimentary-right to determine what does and doesn’t go into my body?” Josie is in the hospital because of the decision she has made not to eat; she is doing nothing productive with her life because being thin is her priority, and only when she chooses to start eating will her life get better.

The choices people make impact the course their life will take and how others view them as an individual. It is important that people make choices that reflect their morals and ideals. The essays “What We Eat,” by Eric Schlosser, “The Boston Photographs,” by Nora Ephron, and “Life Size,” by Jenefer Shute all represent the importance of making the right choices. Life is full of choices that people must face in a responsible manner.

The Struggle for Equality

            We’ve all heard the saying “life is not fair.” Inequality has been a part of life since the beginning of time. All humans experience varying forms of injustices at different points in life. There is a common thread of inequality in the three essays “No Name Woman,” by Maxine Hong Kingston, “The Moral Obligations of Living in a Democratic Society,” by Cornell West, and “Nobel Lecture,” by Kofi Annan.

            In Maxine Hong Kingston’s “No Name Woman,” a mother tells her daughter a story of her aunt, who was never to be spoken of after the story was told. The family was ashamed of her because she conceived a child with a man who was not her husband. The mother tells her daughter, “We say that your father has all brothers because it is as if she had never been born.” The family disowned her because she is viewed as an embarrassment to the family. The aunt was a Chinese woman who suffered injustice because of her fear of voicing the truth. She drowns herself and her newborn baby in a well after her fellow villagers ransacked her home, because she became pregnant while her husband was away. The woman was in raped by a man who threatened her, “If you tell your family, I’ll beat you. I’ll kill you. Be here again next week.” The man was the one who organized the raid against her; two innocent lives were ruined because of one man’s inhumane and careless actions. The Chinese culture allowed for women to take the blame for men’s wrongdoings. Even the woman’s family, “…expected her alone to keep the traditional ways, which her brothers, now among the barbarians, could fumble without detection.” Women were held accountable for the problems in the home and in society, and were expected to allow the men to live as they wished. Nowadays, there is less societal inequality seen between men and women, although it will never be a completely resolved issue.

            The second essay, “The Moral Obligations of Living in a Democratic Society,” by Cornell West, discusses the unfairness to blacks in American society. “[W.E.B.] Du Bois asserted that race in this country is the fetishization of a problem, black bodies on white space.” For years, black people have fought for justice and equality with whites in America. Often times it is generalization and stereotype of black culture that leads to discrimination among the African race. It is important to have respect and understanding for other cultures so that as a nation, America can grow stronger and more unified. “The roots of democracy are fundamentally grounded in mutual respect, personal responsibility, and social accountability.” Cornell West emphasizes the importance of democracy in our country and how it gives each person a dignified voice. America is a diverse country, so in order to have a successful democracy, Americans must all have mutual respect for differentiating cultures and races. Another point that West makes is with the image of the “welfare queen,” referring to black women. “Looking at the history of black women in America, on the plantation taking care of white children in white households, how is it possible that they have become the symbol of laziness?” Stereotypes are generalized thoughts that cause this sort of problematic discrimination in America. The stereotypes and generalities often made about black people in America come from ignorance, of which many people are guilty of.

            In “Nobel Lecture,” Kofi Annan “suggests that each human deserves to live in peace and that we can achieve peace for each person by ending poverty, preventing violent conflict, and encouraging democracy.” Annan uses an example of a newborn girl in Afghanistan in his speech, and explains that the conditions of her upcoming life would seem unbearable to those who live more fortunately. It is hard for more fortunate people to imagine how hard it would be to live an underprivileged life. “Today’s real borders are not between nations, but between powerful and powerless, free and fettered, privileged and humiliated.” Annan stresses the importance of respect for others and respect for oneself, as it also relates to the prosperity of a nation. He says the United Nations is founded on the principle of the equal worth of every human being. The United Nations is the nearest thing to a representative institution that addresses the issues and concerns of all people in order to be fair. “…Beneath the surface of states and nations, ideas and language, lies the fate of individual human beings in need.” Humans are all in need of respect and equality. In “Nobel Lecture,” Kofi Annan explains the need for respect and equality in order for a successful United Nations. Equality begins from within- once we learn to love ourselves, we can learn to love others, and respect diversity.

            Maxine Hong Kingston, Cornell West, and Kofi Annan all discuss the theme of injustice in their essays. Though each essay was very different, the struggle for equality was apparent in each piece of writing. Inequality will continue to be a struggle among people, until we can fully accept and respect each other’s differences.  Life is not fair, and it never will be, but it would definitely be a lot easier if only everyone could be treated more equally.