Ballad of the Landlord (Masterplots II: Poetry, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Langston Hughes
- First Published: 1940
- Type of Work: Ballad
- Genres: Poetry, Ballad
- Subjects: African Americans, Discrimination, Justice, United States or Americans, Blacks, Social issues, Poverty or poor people, Landlords or tenants
The Poem
In “Ballad of the Landlord,” Langston Hughes appropriates the traditional ballad form but uses it in a contemporary urban setting to relate a current and crushing social problem. This conjunction of traditional form and contemporary content lends further power to the poem’s cry for social justice. The poem contains nine ballad stanzas (although the strict stanzaic structure is abandoned in the last three) that, in traditional use of the form, would narrate a tale of a dramatic or romantic adventure. The story here, however, tells of protest and jail. In the...
[The entire page is 1356 words long]
