The following essay compares the artistic inclinations of Countee Cullen and Langston Hughes. During the 1920s, the two were Harlem's most prominent poets. As a result, any conversation between the two was prized as literary and artistic gold. In this essay entitled "Jazz or Junk", we gain a glimpse into what motivated these two artistically, inspiring each to create, as well as what elements and themes and dispositions towards art in art they believed were unacceptable. The following discussion analyzes the literary conversation these two had surrounding Hughes's volume of poetry entitled, The Weary Blues, tracing the themes that made these two representative literary minds. In his critique of Hughes's collection of poetry, The Weary Blues, Countee Cullen asserted that there were and were not appropriate realms through which true poetry could extend and further suggested that Hughes's jazz poems did not exist within any realm of artistic propriety. Cullen declares: "Never having been one to think all subjects and forms proper for poetic consideration, I regard these jazz poems as interlopers in the company of the truly beautiful poems in other sections of the book." (Mullen, 37) The significance of this statement from Cullen is that it does not simply talk about the form of Hughes's jazz poems as failing to adhere to traditional conceptions of what can be poetic, but he locates his disdain for Hughes's art squarely on his jazz poems. He insists that the use of jazz in Hughes's poetry not only infringes improperly upon what is true poetry, but also distracts the reader from the successful poems in the volume. Cullen remarks: "Dull books cause no schisms, raise no dissensions, create no parties." (Mullen, 39) The question that one must ask is why does Cullen feel Hughes's jazz and blues poetry is dull? What are the ethical and aesthetical choices Hughes is making in this work with which Cullen finds fault? In order to answer these questions, it is necessary to examine his opinion of "The Cat and the Saxophone". In his critique of the The Weary Blues, Cullen presents a portion of this poem that is difficult to adequately understand. He does so in order to draw attention to the frenzy and disorder he believes are emblematic of Hughes's jazz poems. His rendering is as follows: EVERYBODY Half-pint- Gin? No, make it LOVES MY BABY corn. You like Liquor, don't you, honey? BUT MY BABY As one can see, Cullen's selection does not give the reader enough context to understand what is happening. Instead his selection intimates the sense that Hughes's jazz poetry is inherently incoherent and nonsensical, supporting Cullen's critique. Cullen misrepresents Hughes's poem in order to support his argument. His critique continues: "In the face of accomplished fact, I cannot say This will never do, but I feel that it ought never to have been done." (Mullen, 38) Instead, Cullen believes Hughes should conform to traditional ideas of proper subjects and form that showcase Hughes's ability in other poems that move Cullen to label him "a remarkable poet of the colorful." (Mullen, 39) For audio of Cullen reading his poem, "Heritage," click here Cullen cites Hughes's poem "Caribbean Sunset" also in Hughes's collection in order to illustrate his opinion of what must constitute worthy poetry. In the poem, Hughes writes "God having a hemorrhage/ Blood coughed across the sky/ Staining the dark sea red:" Cullen admires that this poem reflects the values, subjects and tropes of romantic, sentimental and Victorian poetry, specifically in this particular poem's imaging of the Caribbean. Though its readers may never have witnessed the Caribbean, Hughes helps the reader to create the image mentally by conjuring ideas from reader's imagination using extended metaphor. This, for Cullen, is a great example of what to do poetically. Cullen and other bourgeois intellectuals insist that art should only aspire to "that dignified company, that select and austere circle of high literary expression which we call poetry." He conveys this idea through juxtaposing "The Cat and the Saxophone" with the more traditionally formed "Caribbean Sunset." (Mullen, 39) There are several key points about Cullen's perspective in this quotation that are essential to unpack in order to understand the nature of his critique on Hughes. First, Cullen says true poetry belongs to "dignified company" and "select and austere circle." These terms evoke images of exclusion of simple and undignified art. His use of "select and austere" inform the reader that the criteria for what is poetry are difficult to meet and only achievable through employing scrupulous and complex means. Also, through his use of the circle as his metaphor for significant art, Cullen implies that the extents of what is included under his notion of "poetry" is worthy of strict policing. The very images stir up notions of confinement, separation and exclusion from uncomely artistic production. An additional point to note is that Cullen speaks from a very defined sense of a "we" capable of producing writing of "poetical worth." He defines the poetic tastes of this we through the examples he cites, as inviting lofty or ancient metaphor, metered along traditional rhyme schemes like sonnets, and most importantly, disconnected from anything common like jazz. Failing to meet these standards, he insists, makes writing dull or simple. On behalf of this we, Cullen essentially works to guard poetry from artists and topics that do not adhere to this particular notion of aesthetic value. He hopes by way of this policing, to represent art and the artistic to the exclusion of novel forms that present new views on where, when and on what one can locate poetry. Taken as a group his selections in this book [his poems in The Weary Blues] seem one-sided to me. They tend to hurl this poet into the gaping pit that lies before all Negro writers, in the confines of which they become racial artists instead of artists plain and simple. There is too much emphasis on strictly Negro themes; and this is probably an added reason for my coldness to the jazz poems-they seem to set a too definite limit upon an already limited field. (Mullen, 39) In this particular quotation, Cullen lays out in the plainest terms what are his issues with Hughes's poetry. The mort troubling of Hughes's tactics for Cullen remains his focus on "strictly Negro themes." He insists that Hughes's method of focusing on black subjects and idiom "hurl" him into a "gaping pit" where Negro writers become "racial artists" and no longer "artists plain and simple." He describes this pit as encouraging society to simply the wide array of topics available to an artist "plain and simple," denoting a sort of imbalance he describes as one-sidedness. He concludes that it is precisely this limiting of possible topics that America will in turn read back onto the black race, setting "a too definite limit upon an already limited field." The limits to which he refers allude to the tradition of minstrelsy and caricature of black American from white society in which American art and history have confined the black American. Through arguing about such art's ability to confine, Cullen suggests that this art encourages white consumers to believe that all black Americans are indeed jazz players still good-timing their way through American life after hundreds of years. The true offense to Cullen comes in that he believes this art casts this image while failing to represent the diversity and complexity of the black American experience, more broadly. His very language denotes the treacherousness and danger of Hughes's project. It is clear by the end of his critique that Cullen's aesthetic judgments and his ethical notions about what sorts of lifestyles are the most representative or the most uplifting to the race, are derived from fundamentally different sources than those of Hughes: those of the bourgeois intellectual class. Consequently Cullen's dismissive critique of the poem "The Cat and the Saxophone" overlooks Hughes's innovative form in favor of the glaring offenses he believes Hughes strikes in where he locates the poem's action. In the poem, Hughes intermingles blues or jazz lyrics with a conversation between two people in a club. The capital letters in the poem refer to the lyrics while the lower-case print denotes the conversation between the people: EVERYBODY Half-pint- Gin? No, make it LOVES MY BABY corn. You like Liquor, don't you, honey? BUT MY BABY Sure. Kiss me, DON'T LOVE NOBODY daddy. BUT ME. Say! EVERYBODY Yes? WANTS MY BABY I'm your BUT MY BABY sweetie, ain't I? DON'T WANT NOBODY Sure. BUT Then let's ME, do it! SWEET ME. Charleston, mamma! ! (Rampersad and Roessel, 89) In this poem, Hughes attempts to immerse the reader in the club scene through interrupting the dialogue between the two speaking personas with blues lyrics. Though abrupt and confusing upon an initial read without guidance, this syntax achieves one of his essential goals with his blues poetry: to represent a dialogue between the performed lyric and the spoken word and to present the blues as composed of this dialogue evocative of human feeling and intimacy. Through the poem's construction, Hughes essentially argues that one cannot simply pause the dialogue and convey the same feel. Through running the lyrics through the dialogue, the reader is forced to understand the spoken words of everyday life and the music in jazz clubs as constitutive of a living symbiosis. For an example of this interplay of spoken and musical accompaniment, click here for audio of Hughes reading his poem, "Dream Montage" The poem places in conversation three personas and ultimately produces a whole from the intersection of its parts. The activity of these two personas corresponds with the climax in the lyrics and the completion of the second blues stanza. The two blues stanzas which when read continuously appear as follows: EVERYBODY LOVES MY BABY BUT MY BABY DON'T LOVE NOBODY BUT ME. EVERYBODY WANTS MY BABY BUT MY BABY DON'T WANT NOBODY BUT ME, SWEET ME The words of the lyric's narrative relates how "BABY" selects the persona out of "EVERYBODY" and is reflected in the actions of the two speaking personas. As this occurs, persona 1 who buys the drink and persona 2 who meets her at the bar are allowed to meet and become intimate. By the close of the initial stanza, persona 1 invites persona 2 to a kiss. This invitation marks an intimate level of communication between the two parties who may or may not even know each other. Notwithstanding, the construction of the poem suggests that it is the words of the lyrics that enable the two speaking personas to connect. As the second lyric begins, persona 1 seeks to define the level of intimacy asking: "I'm your sweetie, ain't I?" This statement signifies progress from their initial interaction at the bar. Under these new circumstances, persona 2's selection of persona 1 as his "sweetie" corresponds with the selection "BABY" makes of the lyrical persona. Again, it seems as if the lyrics imbue their power on persona 1 and persona 2 enabling them to connect as in the song. The song lyrics seem to necessitate an object and the two speaking personas are where the lyrics locate their work. Taken inversely, this interruption and intermingling implies that the jazz lyrics are empty of meaning or usefulness without an audience to witness, receive and participate in them. The lyrics in turn have evocative power, enabling conversation between the speakers. Hughes attempts to draw the reader's attention to this power in order to adequately represent the blues while presenting the dialogue the blues enable. This piece is significant because it relates Hughes's intimate connection to common people. More than simply a song about two people in a club, the structure of the poem reflects his core values: being in solidarity with the "folk". Inherent in this statement is the understanding that the blues not only consist of instruments in harmony with corresponding music, but that the blues are also about people utilizing the raw humanness it exposes or creates. The two speakers are able through the music to dialogue intimately, rather than simply to speak to each other; the blues turns the mere speech of two speakers into dialogue. Additionally, the two are able to draw on the intimacy the music produces and the poem concludes in their dance: "The let's/…do it!/…Charleston,/ mamma" It is ultimately the performance of the blues that allows the two speaking personas to perform a more free sense of themselves. When performed, the blues lyrics act as a sort of meeting place where the speaking personas not only interact, but also physically perform their oneness in the dance they share. Performance of dance and of dialogue by way of the blues presents the freedom that exists, according to Hughes's suggestions, in the realm of performance. More so, this poem represents jazz and music not as a confining factor according to Cullen's rendition, but one that liberates. Hughes's goal was not to simply utilize racial themes, but to represent common black life in an authentic and affirming manner. Rather than presenting form and artistic method that is simplistic, Cullen's critique of Hughes's collection signifies a difference in aesthetic judgments. While Cullen's aesthetics emerge from the tradition of classical English prose and poetry with cryptic allusions and regimented rhyme schemes, Hughes focused on the lives, rhythms and humanity of the common folk in American society. Buckets or Books? | NAACP or UNIA? | Home Click characters above to navigate the site. New Negro | Set The Stage | Buckets or Books? | Jazz or Junk? | NAACP or UNIA? | Church Leaders | Finale! | Curtain Call