I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

3 Pages 775 Words

Literary Analysis
As shown in by Maya Angelou, Cat’s in the Cradle by Harry Chapin and Family Portrait by Alicia Moore, family greatly affects who a person grows up to be. All of these writings show examples of children living their lives based on how their parents lived their lives. However, they all have different styles and methods of expressing their ideas.

In I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, the author tells about her home life using metaphors. She speaks of them almost as if they were interesting people she just happened to come into contact with in her life, other than her family. Maya Angelou very rarely quoted anything her mother said. She talks about her a lot, but didn’t include much dialogue between her mother and herself in her memoirs. However, she did comment a lot on her mother’s exterior. “My mother’s beauty literally assailed me. Her red lips split to show even white teeth and her fresh-butter color looked see-through clean.” Maya commented on her mother’s appearance quite often, which led me to believe that she never really knew her mother all that well. All she knew was what she saw. This is quite the same in Family Portrait by Alicia Moore. The only side of her parents it seemed she was quite aware of was the side that was always fighting, always angry. “Mama please stop crying, I can’t stand the sound.” It seemed that her parents were never content with their home situation. It was a never-ending quest to prove to her mother and father that she could be better. Unlike in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, this author seemed to be blaming herself for all the wrong that existed in her family. “I won’t spill the milk at dinner, I’ll be so much better, I’ll do everything right, I’ll be your little girl forever, I’ll go to sleep at night.” The author recognized the hardships in the family and tried to get the characters to fix their own problems.
The theme in C...