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Pronouns in Literature pp 33–53Cite as

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“We Have Tomorrow Bright Before Us Like a Flame”: Pronouns, Enactors, and Cross-Writing in The Dream Keeper and Other Poems

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Abstract

Langston Hughes (1902–1967) was a renowned and celebrated twentieth-century African-American poet who contributed significant literary outputs in the cultural movement known as the Harlem Renaissance and also published poems for children. This chapter draws on Text World Theory to explore Hughes’ use of first-person pronouns in two poems from The Dream Keeper. In doing so, it demonstrates how the potential for ambiguous, dual referents is an important stylistic feature of Hughes’ presentation of childhood and children in poetry that is aimed at both adult and child audiences.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aston University, Birmingham, UK

    Marcello Giovanelli

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  1. Marcello Giovanelli
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Humanities, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, United Kingdom

    Alison Gibbons

  2. Department of English Literature and Modern Languages, Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, United Kingdom

    Andrea Macrae

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Giovanelli, M. (2018). “We Have Tomorrow Bright Before Us Like a Flame”: Pronouns, Enactors, and Cross-Writing in The Dream Keeper and Other Poems . In: Gibbons, A., Macrae, A. (eds) Pronouns in Literature. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95317-2_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95317-2_3

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-349-95316-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-349-95317-2

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