Final Project Poetry

Analyzing “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou

Disusun oleh:

Name: Cinta Rahma Hasari

NIM : 205110100111013
Class : Poetry C

UNIVERSITAS BRAWIJAYA
FAKULTAS ILMU BUDAYA
PROGRAM STUDI SASTRA INGGRIS
MALANG
2022
 “Still I Rise” is a poem by the American civil rights activist and writer Maya
Angelou. Maya Angelou’s "Still I Rise" is a powerful poem that draws on a range of
influences, including her background and the African American experience in the United
States. Its message of liberation and survival was a consistent theme in Angelou's work. The
poem was published in Angelou’s third poetry collection Still I Rise in 1978. Years after it
was published, the poem continues to reach readers and audiences.

An American poet, storyteller, activist, and autobiographer, Maya Angelou was born
Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri. Angelou had a broad career as a singer, dancer,
actress, composer, and Hollywood’s first female black director, but became most famous as a
writer, editor, essayist, playwright, and poet. As a civil rights activist, Angelou worked for
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. In 2000, Angelou was awarded the National
Medal of Arts by President Bill Clinton. In 2010, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of
Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the U.S., by President Barack Obama. Angelou was
awarded over 50 honorary degrees before her death.

Maya Angelou’s work often focused on the experience of being a black woman in
America. “Still I Rise” becomes more than a call for strength in the face of hardship it also
shows the power and beauty of blackness. Although the speaker’s racist society believes that
black people’s lives and bodies are less worthy than others, the speaker herself rejects that
idea. The speaker asserts her full humanity and also associates her body with symbols of
value, such as “oil wells,” “gold mines,” and “diamonds.” These comparisons implicitly
critique racism and assumptions of beauty and power as being tied only to whiteness and
masculinity, respectively. Instead, the poem becomes an ode to black womanhood.

In a racist world, the poem implies, society continuously denies the full humanity of
black people. Society wishes to the speaker were “broken,” “cut,” or even “kill[ed].” Rather
than valuing the lives and humanity of black people, society actively hopes to harm and
destroy them. Society’s “shame[full]” history of slavery was of course the ultimate
dehumanization. Black people who were enslaved experienced unimaginable “pain” and
“nights of terror and fear” as any agency over their own lives and bodies were taken away
from them. The speaker references this history to illustrate how little society has historically
valued black life.

‘Still I Rise’ is a nine-stanza poem that’s separated into uneven sets of lines. The first
seven stanzas contain four lines, known as quatrains, stanzas eight has six lines and the ninth
has nine. The first seven stanzas follow a rhyme scheme of ABCB, the eighth: ABABCC, and
the ninth: ABABCCBBB. The first two lines of "Still I Rise" establish the antagonistic
relationship between the speaker, implied to be a black woman, and her oppressor, addressed
throughout simply as "you." The speaker accepts that her oppressor has the power to write
"lies" about the speaker and present them as historical facts. This suggests that the "you" here
represents society as a whole and more specifically white society. The speaker here is thus
talking back to a world that has tried to suppress her voice, insisting that her truth and spirit
will rise above whatever falsehoods a prejudiced society wants to spread.
In the fourth and final line of the stanza, the speaker uses a simile to compare her rise
to that of dust kicked up when stamping on the ground. There is also a subtle biblical allusion
to the image of this rising dust: in the Bible, humans are said to be created by God from
"dust" and to return to "dust" upon death. By stating that she is "like dust," the speaker asserts
that she, too, is a creation of God and is equal to anyone else. In doing so, the speaker
demands her oppressor and society as a whole recognize her full humanity. In rhyming "lies"
with "rise," the poem emphasizes that the speaker can directly counter the "lies" of the
oppressor with her "rise." This emphasis reiterates the power of the speaker's "rise.". The
speaker continues her questioning of society. By this time in the poem, it becomes apparent
that the speaker has placed society on trial and is now in the process of cross-examination.
She knows the answers to these questions, but to ask them is to incriminate the offender.
While she asks incriminating questions, she reveals incredible self-confidence despite the
oppression of society. There is an important symbol of the “black ocean” in the eighth stanza.
This ocean represents black people. The speaker says, “I’m a black ocean”. Here, it acts as a
symbol of energy and immensity. The last stanza contains another symbol in the usage of the
word “night”. It is a symbol of fear, oppression, and pessimism.
This poem is filled with vivid imagery. To begin with, there is visual imagery in the
very beginning. Through this line, “But still, like dust, I’ll rise.” So, here the image of “dust”
helps the speaker to make her point. According to her, none can control the dust when the
revolutionary wind arrives. Likewise, she will rise like dust particles and blind those who trod
her before. The following stanzas contain some more images. For example, readers can find
the image of oil wells pumping oil. The third stanza has images of the moon, sun, and tides.
In this stanza, she depicts the tides that are springing high. It is compared to “hope”. There is
an image of a black individual who is in extreme distress. This image represents how they
were tortured and made silent by the unlawful fist. Angelou uses the images of “gold mines”
and “diamonds” to heighten the irony of this piece.
  References:

1. Wikipedia 2022, Maya Angelou, accessed 2 June 2022,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_Angelou.
2. Ketler 2021, Maya Angelou: The Meaning Behind Her Poem “Still I Rise”, accessed
2 June 2022, https://www.biography.com/news/maya-angelou-still-i-rise.
3. Angie 2022, In-Dept Look at Maya Angelou’s Still I Rise, Study.com, accessed 2 June
2022, https://study.com/learn/lesson/maya-angelou-and-still-i-rise-overview-
summary-analysis.html.

Maya Angelou: The Meaning Behind Her Poem

"Still I Rise"