We Real Cool

A detailed Summary of We Real Cool


Both poetry and prose employ language as their means of transmitting their messages and their themes. In prose, the language tends to lie in the background serving to transparently provide a window into the world it portrays and the meaning the passage contains. Poetry, however, as can be seen in "We Real Cool" by Gwendolyn Brooks, uses the language itself as the means to express the content and significance of the work. Written in 1960, Brooks most likely intended for this poem to reflect the attitudes of African American youth of the time who decided to drop out of school and pursue a life of deviant behavior. In "We Real Cool", Brooks uses line structure and rhythm, simple and smooth diction (which reveal tone), and rhyme to convey her thoughts on the uncertainties that the subjects of the poem feel about themselves and their "coolness".

The structure of the lines of "We Real Cool" repeatedly begins with the action (predicate) of the sentence and ends with the subject of the following sentence ("We"). This serves to empha


It is also to be noted that as stated earlier the poem is not expository in explaining any actions, movements, or plot developments. In contrast to typical prose, this poem does not detail any actions that the young men at the pool hall take. It merely provides you with their thoughts and words through language. The poem is more colorful and interesting than a prose explanation of the same situation would be because it does not have to explicitly explain what the meaning and theme are. These qualities are inferred from the language itself.

Through the previously stated features of the poem, Gwendolyn Brooks is able to speak more profoundly and deeply about this group of truant pool players than any prose could have. The structure and rhythm of the poem both are crucial in understanding the humor and tragedy of the young men's lives. Through the usage of many figurative language tools, Brooks is able to capture all of her thoughts about the situation into eight lines of what would have been pages of prose.

Furthermore, t

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Approximate Word count = 699
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English

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