An Analysis of Paul Laurence Dunbars We Wear the Mask :: We Wear the Mask Essays

An Analysis of Paul Laurence Dunbars We Wear the MaskIt has been said many time that You cant forecast a book by its cover and Dont judge a man until you have walked a mile in his shoes? A person may appear one way on the extracurricular but may be feeling the total opposite on the inside. He may be masking his true emotions with a false appearance. In We Wear the Mask it seems that Paul Laurence Dunbar is conveying this message to his audience.The African-American slaves of the early United States are prime examples of how emotions can be repressed. This group of people was enured with such disrespect and humiliation that it is understand fit why they would mask their true thoughts and their emotions. To make their daily lives easier, they spoke and acted the ways that their uninfected owners dictated. Their lives had, to a point, been taken apart from them. But, there were some things that could never be taken away from them their inner strength and their spiritism. No matter how a slave was treated, how hard he had to work, or how little he had, hedid have total control of his own thoughts and beliefs. Those things could never be taken from him.This poem cries out with the hurt that African-Americans, throughout history, suffered with. To be able to endure this daily persecution, these people had to draw on their inner strength. When Dunbar wrote,With torn and bleeding hearts we smile, it is obvious of the agony felt and of how a smile is sometimes worn in order to camouflage ones true emotions.A deep, religious faith was a saving grace to these people as a whole. Ones spirituality can carry them through even the most dreadful situations. This idea is evident when Dunbar penned the lines, we smile,but, O great Christ, our cries To thee from tortured souls arise. When all else had failed, slaves could pray and feel that perfection had heard them. At last, their cries would be heard, their prayers answered, andtheir hearts relieved.We all have hide our e motions at one time or another. We put on false faces and realise for many different reasons. We all lie, in one form or another, be it a big lie or a little white one. Whether it be to save our self or the feelings of another we should all remember the Golden Rule Do unto others as you would have them do unto you (Luke 631).