I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

On Maya Angelou and Pablo Picasso

The late Maya Angelou was a poet, an actress, a memoirist, and a civil rights activist. Aside from plays, movies, poetry and essays, she wrote seven volumes of autobiographies that explored the themes of economic, racial, and sexual oppression. Maya Angelou was a respected spokesperson for the African American people and she had a huge influence on the American culture that went beyond her poetry and memoirs. She was a confidante to civil rights leaders, a poet to presidents, and an unapologetic conscience who touched everyone.

Her 1969 memoir, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (volume 1 of the seven series), made literary history as the first nonfiction bestseller by an African American woman.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is a poignant and intimate window into Mayas early childhood years growing up in Stamps, Arkansas with her grandmother and brother. Stamps was in south at the forefront of racial segregation where Maya witnessed inequality and injustice first hand which left a deep impression and influenced her work later in life.

She wrote this memoir like a story in a beautiful first person prose that was about the joys, trials and tribulations of childhood and teenage years. She allowed a few people into her life but their unique personalities went on to influence her worldview for a long time such as her grandmothers resolve, her brothers love, her mothers gaiety, her uncles determination.

Maya Angelou wrote with a unique ability to make any reader, from whatever point in their own life, identify with a young black child and share its experiences. She did not alienate or select her audience; she spoke to all. She wrote from a black perspective but very skillfully made it the readers own perspective, placing me firmly in the mind of herself as a child. She wrote about her feelings of confusion, pride, hatred, despair, guilt, fear and rage with reasoning - helping me understand her frames of reference.

There’s a feeling of regret in discovering a writer after they have passed on. For so many classic authors we don’t have the opportunity since they’ve been long-dead. Maya passed away in 2014 after an amazing life of achievements. I wish I had known more about her during her lifetime - It would have been nice to appreciate her while she was alive.

The title of the book confused me because it did not feel self explanatory. Looking it up, I found out that when searching for a title that best represented the nature of her story, Maya Angelou turned to a poem entitled “Sympathy” published in 1899 by Paul Laurence Dunbar, an important late 19th-century American poet, and child of slaves. Dunbar died in 1906 and there are no recordings of him reciting his work, but I found the poem.

Sympathy by Paul Laurence Dunbar

I know what the caged bird feels, alas!
When the sun is bright on the upland slopes;
When the wind stirs soft through the springing grass,
And the river flows like a stream of glass;
When the first bird sings and the first bud opes,
And the faint perfume from its chalice steals—
I know what the caged bird feels

I know why the caged bird beats his wing
Till its blood is red on the cruel bars;
For he must fly back to his perch and cling
When he fain would be on the bough a-swing;
And a pain still throbs in the old, old scars
And they pulse again with a keener sting—
I know why he beats his wing!

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,—
When he beats his bars and he would be free;
It is not a carol of joy or glee,
But a prayer that he sends from his heart’s deep core,
But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings—
I know why the caged bird sings!

Movie Adaptation of the book (1979)

I found the 1979 adaptation of the book on YouTube. Its the full movie.

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Guernica - Pablo Picasso

Earlier this week, while reading Franco and Spanish Civil War, I found out about the 1937 bombing of the town of Guernica which inspired the monochrome painting by Picasso and remains one of his more famous works.  

Earlier in 1937, Picasso was commissioned by the Spanish Republican Government to paint a mural for the Spanish pavilion at the Paris World Fair. He worked dispassionately at first (making caricatures of Franco) until the the bombing of Guernica in April 1937. Picasso’s painting was his outrage at the incident and became the twentieth century’s most powerful indictment against war. Upon completion, Guernica was exhibited in venues around the world and its acclaim helped bring worldwide attention to the Spanish Civil War.

Why Guernica?

Picasso’s painting is based on the events of April 27, 1937, when German air force, acting in support of Franco, bombed the village of Guernica in northern Spain, a city of no strategic military value. It was history’s first aerial saturation bombing of a civilian population. For over three hours, twenty five bombers dropped 100,000 pounds of explosive and incendiary bombs on the village, reducing it to rubble. Artillery gumming killed defenseless civilians trying to flee. The devastation was appalling: the city burned for three days and over seventy percent of it was destroyed.

When the press reported the devastation through reports, newsreels and documentaries - everyone along with Picasso was horrified. The painting Guernica was his visual response.

Piecing Together Guernica

This painting is not easy to decipher. Everywhere there seems to be death and dying. As one’s eyes adjust to the action, figures begin to emerge. This article very aptly deconstructs the painting and the figures in it which over time have become powerful representations

The tapestry that features on the UN building was commissioned by Nelson Rockefeller in 1955, and subsequently ceded by his widow to the United Nations. It is a reproduction of the work and was carried out under the supervision of Picasso himself. The tapestry version usually sits at the UN, acting as a powerful visual statement against the horrors of war.

In 2003, when Colin Powell made his case for war with Iraq, U.N. officials hung a blue curtain over a tapestry at the entrance of the security council which was the spot where diplomats and others made statements to the press. Mr Powell would’ve have had a hard time speaking about war and seducing the world with the idea while having the 20th century’s most iconic protest against the inhumanity of war as his backdrop.

To learn more about Picasso’s Guernica, listen to this episode from BBC In Our Time - history (One of my all time favorite podcasts)

Saima