Uxt Task 1

The author of “Still I Rise” is Maya Angelou, a well-known poet, author, and civil rights activist. This poem is about a poet who struggles to meet the social pressure and injustices of her time. Her poetry thus concentrates on two kinds of oppression – both racial oppression, and sexism. Amidst the challenges and adversities, she managed to survive and successfully claims that she will not be broken nor will she be defeated no matter how many times she is brought down by society. In this poem “Still I Rise”, I will be looking at critical works by Sandra Cookson, R. B. Stepto, and Lyman B. Hagen and stating why I agree with them.

Maya Angelou’s poem “Still I Rise” was published in 1978 at one of the most productive and successful periods of Angelou’s career. “Still I Rise” tells about bouncing back and rising up past oppression and hate. The speaker in Angelou’s poem talks to a direct audience, asking them questions, announcing to them that no matter what they do, she will always rise back up. The poem is broken up into quatrains, although the last two stanzas use the repetition of the phrase “I rise” between the complete lines. The author uses figurative language in every stanza of her poem and uses similes and metaphors to create imagery and to get the tone and the theme of the poem across to the reader. Angelou uses figurative language to convey the message of resilience and succeeding even through hatred.

“Still I Rise,” written by poet Maya Angelou, has a blend of tones. Some are playful, funny, angry, confident, and bitter. However, the poem’s tone, as the title implies, is conquering."Still I Rise" is a poem about strength, perseverance, and confirmation. It is about what is expected of a person and what that person is able to do in spite of the expectations.

‘Still I Rise’ was written by an Afro-American poet Maya Angelou and consists of a mixture of tones, such as: playful, angry, comical and bitter. Slavery was long abolished but Angelou saw its effects on society and black people. In this poem she declares that no hatefulness of society will determine her success. In the poem ‘Still I Rise’ she is not only proclaiming her triumph but also calls others to stand up for themselves and live against society’s expectations.

‘Still I Rise’ show other aspects of the problems that women face. Within the poem, Angelou uses repetition to accentuate powerful imagery. She repeats “I Rise” throughout the poem and frequently leaves it as a two-word line. This draws, even more, attention to the image of her continuously rising up against anyone may put her down. Angelou also employs the use of a

Angelou’s style is vivid and passionate, turning her poem into a personal battle- a confrontation with her oppressors. As opposed to this, Sexton’s style is confessional and speculative, examining the events of her life and her experiences. Both poems are written in the first person which creates a strong connection between the shunned personas and the poet. However, Angelou choses to directly address her oppressors with the word “you”, marking her poem as a confrontation. Sexton instead presents her oppressors using symbolism and connotation, shown by the “driver” and the persona of the witch (the image of her fabricated by society). In this way, Sexton places the focus onto her personal story, creating more empathy with the audience. In combination with this, the difference in the use of imagery encapsulates the tone of each poem. Still I rise is filled with imagery of wealth (diamonds and oil) and celestial power (the sun, stars and ocean). Angelou uses imagery to metaphorically provide herself with the resources that her oppressors own, and even more, showcasing the power of her resolve. By contrast Sexton uses imagery to create each “snapshot” of her life, her use of imagery provides the audience with context and tone. For example, when she evokes the image of flames and cracked ribs, coupled with the symbol of the witch, she creates a horrifying image of historical witch

Maya Angelou had a troubled childhood, when her parents separated at the age of 3, she and her brother went and lived with their grandmother in Stamps, Arkansas, this is where she first experienced racial discrimination. At the age of 7, she was raped by her mother’s boyfriend. When her uncle found out, he killed Angelou’s rapist, traumatized she stopped speaking for 5 years. During WWII, she won a scholarship to study dance and acting at the California Labour School. By 1944, she gave birth to her son, Guy, at 16 years old, who she supported by herself. In 1952, she married a Greek

The poem Still I Rise was a poem written by Maya Angelou. The poem was published in 1978 and it was written in America. The author of the poem, Angelou, was a famous poet which she is most commonly known for but she was also an actor, author, and civil rights activists. Growing up Angelou had an unpleasant child hood, traumatized for being raped at a young age made Angelou go into silent phase where she would only communicate from scribbles on a tablet but this is where she found her love for reading, writing, and Poetry. Angelou written the poem Still I Rise to remind everyone of there worth and to not let things such as words lower their self esteem.

In the unforgettable poem “Still I Rise”, written by the literary giant, Maya Angelou, the poem eloquently express the plight of the African American people and how they have risen above racism and adversity only to survive and flourish with dignity.

Still I Rise, by the African American poet Maya Angelou, offers a different mixture of tones.(Assertive, Confident, Pride and Sarcasm)Ultimately, however, the poem’s tone, as the work’s title suggests, that the poem will be persuading the reader to never give up. The poem’s first word—“You”—is important. This is a poem clearly putting others in the place of others. It is not simply a private, lyric meditation. Much of its energy comes from its bold and strong feeling. The poem presents us with a black woman willing to speak up for herself, the poem is both highly political and highly personal. The author is finally responding to decades and even centuries of depression and mistreatment. Her tone, then, never sounds unintelligent or mean. Instead,

Arguably one of the most famous American poets, Maya Angelou “uses poetic devices that span language from the beautiful and sublime to vulgar and even scatological.” Due to the uplifting tone of many of her poems, they are extremely popular (Thursby 169). In “Still I Rise” she beautifully uses metaphors and similes, in “Caged Bird” she painstakingly reveals the hope in all things, and lastly in “Phenomenal Woman” Angelou shows the world that women are a powerful and hopeful force to be reckoned with. Maya Angelou’s bold and expressive poetry utilizes metaphors and repetition to explore the underlying theme of hope in the face of adversity. “Still I Rise” is a poem with a narrator confronting their oppressor, who “asserts her confidence

“Still I Rise” was written by Maya Angelou, a female poet in the nineteen-twenties. As a female I the nineteen-twenties, she had to deal with a lack of equality for women and

Within life people have felt left behind, belittled, and denied by the world and those who have tried to destroy the person that they are, the dreams they hope to achieve, the ambition that drives them forward and the miracles they believe can be made out of their lives. Still I Rise is a poem written by Maya Angelou and depicts the struggles that she has encountered and had to overcome in her life, but most importantly it depicts how she has learned how she must rise above all the negative things that bring her down and deny her and has decided to surpass her own limits and the ones that others try to put on her. Much like her human beings been affected by many negative things from their peers, family, and even those who haven’t taken the

Maya Angelou’s “Still I Rise” takes place in the mind of Maya Angelou. She is talking about someone who is saying bad things about her. Even though they are saying bad things about her she won’t let it bring her down she will rise. She shows her Confidence by saying that she will rise, another way she is showing her Confidence is by being confident in her heritage, and her Confidence is evident through her displays of literary devices.

“Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou is about how we have to always rise above criticism and not be afraid to share our opinions even if they are not what everyone else thinks. Maya also says that she “like air I will rise” even after she is pushed down by all the criticism. I believe that while writing this poem she wanted to encourage others to be who they are and stand up for themselves no matter what. She believes that that we should stand up for what we believe in. To express these things in the poem Maya Angelou uses similes such as “ shoulders falling down like teardrops…”. Another simile used by Maya was “like air, I’ll rise”. I believe she used this to convey the fact that after someone knocks you down you have to rise up again and not