To Define is To Limit Learn
Written by Harmony Lehman
DRAMA. It’s a dramatic word, is it not? Well, certainly it is when I make the letters bold, underlined, and capitalized. But writers cannot often get away with something as obvious and strange as making the letters pop out to the reader’s eye in the literal sense. Instead, they use actions to emphasize and metaphors to explain. The imagery must still be there--big, bold, important--but the path to that impression must be taken much more tactfully. While some writers will tell you there’s no formula to their method of expressing this drama, others cite specific examples of how drama is used to characterize certain types of writings.
In Zora Neale Hurston’s essay “Characteristics of Negro Expression,” she lays out her view of just what makes a work of art specifically Negro expression. Her very first section covers drama, and Hurston attempts to qualify the specifics of what elements of drama are uniquely the Black author’s during the Harlem Renaissance. And yet oftentimes to define is to limit--and Hurston’s rigid definitions of Negro Expression in drama which, by analyzing the work of her contemporaries, reveals both examples and counterexamples to her categorization (as is often the case when writers attempt to get into the nitty gritty of what truly defines subsects of writing). By examining two poems, Gwendolyn Bennett’s “To a Dark Girl” and Countee Cullen’s “From the Dark Tower,” we can see how drama is used in Negro writings during the Harlem Renaissance.
One of Hurston's definitions of drama in Black writing is that the author’s “very words are action words…hence the rich metaphor and simile.” In “To a Dark Girl,” Bennett uses several different pieces of imagery, creating a metaphor that eloquently dramatizes the otherwise commonplace actions the speaker describes. The imagery of “something of old forgotten queens/ Lurks in the lithe abandon of your walk” contrasts heartbreakingly with the line, “And something of the shackled slave/ Sobs in the rhythm of your talk.” In all four lines, Bennett takes walking and talking, actions otherwise completely ordinary, and transforms them into vivid, complex images: one of the subject’s forgotten royal ancestry and one of her tragic history of slavery. In this respect, certainly some Black author’s works fall under Hurston’s definition of drama, specifically with respect to action.
Another idea Hurston introduces about drama in Black writing is that “everything is acted out.” Hurston explains that every emotion is highly dramatized--sadness becomes deep, unending grief, joy becomes jubilance--even if that dramatization is unconscious. While surely this fits many poems written during the Harlem Renaissance, Culleen’s “From the Dark Tower” challenges this idea. She writes, “So in the dark we hide the heart that bleeds/ And wait, and tend our agonizing seeds.” This acknowledgement of the hidden pain that many Black people faced alone is not a dramatization of emotion--in fact, it speaks to the feelings long hidden away. These ending lines of “From the Dark Tower” are even reminiscent of Paul Laurence Dunbar’s “We Wear the Mask.” It too exposes the deep sorrow that lies behind false smiles. These examples contradict Hurston’s definition that "everything is acted out.” Therefore, when considering this specific definition of drama, we cannot claim Hurston’s rule is all-encompassing.
In both cases I have laid out for you, you could find examples to support either side of the argument, and many, at that. I have told you there were poems which were rich in metaphor and simile, and other readings might further my point (consider Arna Bontemps’ “Southern Mansion,” Hughes’ “Harlem,” or Bontemps’ “A Black Man Talks of Reaping”). However, even Hurston’s own works, such as “The Gilded Six Bits,” contain little to no metaphor or simile. I have provided you a counterpoint to the definition of drama in acting out emotion, but should you look further, you would find many examples that do adhere to Hurston’s definition (See Countee Cullen’s “Colored Blues Singer,” or Claude McKay’s “Outcast”). My point in all of this is not to discredit Hurston's Characteristics of Negro Expression. I think the majority of it aids in helping one understand the subsect of writing that is considered Negro Expression during the Harlem Renaissance. But all writings that attempt to define art will inevitably fall short. There will be nuances, because life is nothing if not a whole bunch of nuances we must carefully consider, and writing is simply a reflection of life. Yet (and here’s a delicious thought to think on!) maybe that’s partially the point--in defining Negro writing, Hurston has pushed us to consider these pieces of work as a whole. She has made us truly consider this writing for what it is; and through that we have examined the acute suffering and beauty that is conveyed through these works of Negro writing. And that, satisfyingly and undoubtedly, is a win.
