Gwendolyn Brooks And Her Worth To The Literary Canon

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Gwendolyn Brooks and Her Worth to the Literary Canon Gwendolyn Brooks (born in Kansas, 1917) is one of the most famous
African American poets. She was the first African American writer to win a Pulitzer Prize and was best known for her amazing
portrayal of urban black people, who face poverty and racism in their everyday lives. Despite the wide range of African American
poets, Gwendolyn Brooks arguably made the greatest contribution into the Literary Canon not only in the United States, but became
one of the most famous women poets the representatives of the modern poetry - all over the world. As we have already mentioned,
Gwendolyn Brooks' talent made an outstanding contribution into the U.S. poetry. The first half of her creative life she created the
poems that were known for their traditional literary form and language, however, the second half of her career was devoted to the
experiments with the urban black vernacular and free verse.

Yet, it should be taken into consideration that despite all difficulties Gwendolyn Brooks encountered during her life, her thematic
focus has remained the same, as she devoted her verses to the lives of ordinary people, to the problems of poverty, struggle for
freedom and independence, racist and outrage against African Americans, and their attempts to obtain better lives and to struggle
against the devastating attitude towards them. The outstanding talent of Gwendolyn Brooks makes her poetry to sound live. Her
bold appeal, vivid rhymes, and amazing charm of her verses found recognition among the most famous people all over the world. For
example, George E. Kent considers that "Brooks shares with Langston Hughes the achievement of being most responsive to
turbulent changes in the Black Community's vision of itself and to the changing forms of its vibrations during decades of rapid
change. The depth of her responsiveness and her range of poetic resources make her one of the most distinguished poets to appear
in America during the 20th Century." (Kent, 1990) Drastic transformations occurred in the conscience of modern writers and poets
from many countries, including the United States.

The poets, such as Gwendolyn Brooks, refused from the idea that traditional forms, ideas, and concepts of history are able to fill the
human life with the meaningful context. The events that took place soon after World War II made people believe that every moment,
action, and feeling should be treated like something that will never take place again. Gwendolyn Brooks was, probably, the first
African American poet, who understood the necessity to create a truthful picture of reality, as she was describing the lives of blacks
who have to withstand racism, poverty, misfortune, inequality, and other troubles they face in their daily lives (Melhem, 1987). The
literary style and literary form were treated like some sort of conditional, like some improvisation reflecting the creative process and
self-conscience. All these changes were introduced into the modern American poetry by Gwendolyn Brooks in her amazingly
sensitive works. During the period of time, when Gwendolyn Brooks lived and worked, literary categories and forms, that were so
usual and easy to understand, the expressions of literary thought and mind became somewhat suspicious, as the originality was
raised to the status of the new literary tradition in poetry. Gwendolyn Brooks managed to combine usual literary forms with
originality of thought and literary talent.

Gwendolyn Brooks managed to retain the continuity of poetical tradition along with the desire to inspire new life into the U.S. poetry.
She used both traditional and innovative techniques in order to make her poems sound unique. Gwendolyn Brooks became the most
talented U.S. poet, as she masterly used traditional rhymes and fixed metrics along with the bright and vivid colorings, shades, and
tones that made her poems breathe. The poetry of Gwendolyn Brooks is known for refined nature, piety before the elements, and in-
depth conservatism. At the same time, one can easily notice that her works are tradition-oriented.

The distinctive features of her works (similar to other poets traditionalists) the exactness of her portrayals, realistic nature, some
tendency for paradoxes, and, probably, even metaphysics. Her poetry serves a brilliant example of how the poet is able to reach
transparent exactness by using rhymes and formally fixed literary structure. In contrast to other poets, whose works ruin the poetical
and vague tissue of the poem, Gwendolyn Brooks likes to use sound and abrupt, sometimes too emotional words and phrases (Kent,
1990). It seems that Gwendolyn Brooks likes to use rhetorical archaisms, rare words and word combinations, adjectives and
inversions. All these features make traditionally English language to play with bright colors, thus changing it significantly. Sometimes
this effect is created by noble poetic style, while sometimes the poems look too
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