Amiri Baraka

Paper Summary:

This paper examines the life of the black writer and activist born as LeRoi Jones but commonly known as Amiri Baraka. It looks at how due to his membership in and experience with a plurality of different black nationalist movements, his works are significantly more charged in their treatment of racism than most other black poets and playwrights. It analyzes how Baraka's work shows an unflinching willingness to deal with racism in an open and stark way that other writers seem to shy away from.

From the Paper:

"In his play, Dutchman, from 1964, Amiri Baraka demonstrates his willingness to deal with racism in a fairly overt and open fashion. The harshness of his depiction of racism is notably stronger than his contemporaries among African-American writers. Dutchman principally concerns two characters, Lula, who is a young white woman, and Clay, a well-educated young black man in the early sixties. The two meet on a train, and Lula, perhaps for sport or due to some intense erotic attraction to Clay's "otherness," begins to toy with his emotions by flirting and flaunting her own sexuality. Within this dialogue, however, her racism is unflinchingly depicted in a series of terrible comments that she makes to Clay. Looking at the well-dressed Clay, she asks him, "What right do you have to be wearing a three-button suit and stripped tie? Your grandfather was a slave, he didn't go to Harvard" (Baraka, Dutchman p.87)."

More papers on Amiri Baraka:

• Poem Review # 129677 : "Amiri Baraka's "An Agony. As Now"
• Term Paper # 99463 : "Amiri Baraka's "An Agony. As Now"
• Analytical Essay # 8425 : "Amiri Baraka"

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