Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou is one of the most prolific poets of North America. Apart from being a

writer, she was a memoirist, a civil rights activist, a dancer, and an actress. During her life time

she suffered racial prejudices and discrimination. She was a phenomenal woman who wrote

seven autobiographies, three books of essays, and several books of poetry, plays, movies, and

television shows.

Angelou uses a unique style in her prose writing. Her writings have a direct,

conversational voice, inviting readers to identify with her stories. The major traits of her writing

style are diction, syntax, literary devices or figures of speech. Moreover, she wrote in free verse

the poem “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”.

Maya’s writings have literary deceives, such as metaphors. The best example in which

she uses a metaphor is in the title of her first novel “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”,

Angelou compares a caged bird with herself. Besides, she also uses images, personification, and

similes in her poems and narratives. One example of a simile is when Mrs. Cullinan says that

Maya us as quite as a mouse.

Maya Angelou wrote several books and poems. One of the most known poems, later

wrote as a book, is called “I know Why the Caged Bird Sings”. The poem is about racial

oppression, freedom, captivity, and happiness in which there are two birds one is free and the

other is caged, the caged bird represents the Black community in America and around the world.

Maya Angelou is a marvelous woman who could sing (shine) as a free bird despite many

challenges in her life. Besides, Maya was not only a writer, she was an activist who fought for

African Americans. Therefore, that is why I choose her to be in my essay.