I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Maya Angelou perceives herself as a caged bird. A young woman bound by fear. By racism, segregation, sexism and personal insecurities. In I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Angelou describes her coming of age as a precocious but insecure black girl in the American South during the 1930s and subsequently in California during the 1940s. Marguerite Annie Johnson was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on April 4, 1928, the second child of Bailey Johnson, and Vivian (Baxter) Johnson, a nurse and card dealer.
Maya’s parents, who divorced when she is only three years old, sent Maya and her older brother, Bailey, to live with their paternal grandmother, Annie Henderson (whom they call "Momma"), in rural Stamps, Arkansas. As young children, Maya and Bailey struggle with the pain of having been rejected and abandoned by their parents. Growing up in Stamps, Maya faces a southern racism manifested in wearying daily indignities and terrifying lynch mobs. When Maya is eight, her father, of whom she, arrives in Stamps and takes her and Bailey to live with their mother, Vivian, in St. Louis, Missouri. Vivian’s boyfriend, Mr. Freeman, sexually molests Maya, and he later maliciously rapes her. He is violently murdered. Angelou's description of being raped as an eight-year-old child overwhelms the book, although it is presented briefly in the text. Rape is used as a metaphor for the suffering of her race, therefore explicitly detailing Angelou's own perspective upon her life. Maya endures the guilt and shame of having been sexually abused. She believes that she holds absolute responsibility for Mr. Freeman’s death. She refuses to speak. Both Maya and Bailey return to Stamps to live with Momma, who manages to break through Maya’s silence by introducing her to Mrs. Flowers, who tells Maya to read works of literature out loud, giving her books of poetry that help her to regain her voice. This is the first time that Maya feels a sense of belonging and identity. She develops a great love of poetry, in its melody and its imagery. It is through literature that Maya begins to develop as an individual and express herself as a human. Maya becomes aware of both the fragility and the strength of her community during these years in Stamps. She endures several appalling incidents that teach her about the insidious nature of racism and systemic segregation. Momma begins to fear for the children’s well-being and saves money to bring them to Vivian, who now lives in California. Maya grows as a person while living in San Francisco. She suffers horrific physical abuse and runs away to live with a group of homeless teenagers in a junk yard. Maya returns to San Francisco strong and self-assured. She defies racist hiring policies in wartime San Francisco to become the first black streetcar conductor at age fifteen. At sixteen, Maya experiments with her sexuality. She hides her pregnancy from her family for eight months and graduates from high school. The autobiographical account ends as Maya begins to feel confident as a mother to her newborn son. She is able to finally identify herself as a caged bird that has been liberated by love. Maya transforms from a victim of racism with a sense of inferiority into a self-possessed, dignified young woman capable of responding to prejudice. |
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