Comparison and contrast of "Mother to Son" by Langston Hughes and "Mending Wall" by Robert Frost

Lessons In Life

When comparing "Mother To Son" with "Mending Wall" the message given is that with hard work, either manual or emotional life gives rewards.

In "Mother To Son" the mother wants to pass her knowledge of life to him, that nothing is free and with hard work you will receive the feeling of accomplishments. The mother speaks of her hardships in life, but even with those she has always had hope. Even during the darkest times in her life she never gave up.

What greater gift can a mother pass on to her child? The gifts than come from the heart are the greatest. She is trying to let him know that even though she has been climbing all her life she will not give up.

Even though the story of "Mending Wall" focusing on the hard labor that comes once a year to neighbors repairing a common wall between their properties they also share good times together. "Good fences make good neighbor 's". (page 1881)

The neighbor 's speak of hunter 's that have passed during the year. Their walk of the wall gives each neighbor a time to share and reflect on the past years events ' with each other.

Both stories differ in their style, "Mother To Son" gives a hidden approach to life. She is trying to give him subtle hits of what the road of life offers. "Mending Wall" gives a direct approach, it 's a conversation between neighbors that happens once a year, once it happens they go back to the way they were.

Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri, James Langston Hughes was a member of an abolitionist family. His first published poem was also one of his most famous, "The Negro Speaks of Rivers", and it appeared in Brownie 's Book. Later, his poems, short plays, essays and short stories appeared in the NAACP publication Crisis Magazine and in Opportunity Magazine and other publications.( http://www.redhotjazz.com/hughes.html)

Robert Lee Frost was one of America 's leading 20th-century poets and a four-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize. An essentially pastoral poet often associated with rural New England, Frost wrote poems whose philosophical dimensions transcend any region. Although his verse forms are traditional--he often said, in a dig at archrival Carl Sandburg, that he would as soon play tennis without a net as write free verse--he was a pioneer in the interplay of rhythm and meter and in the poetic use of the vocabulary and inflections of everyday speech. His poetry is thus both traditional and experimental, regional and universal. (http://www.robertfrost.org/indexgood.html)

Works Cited

Baym, Nina. "The Norton Anthology of American Literature." 2003

http://www.redhotjazz.com/hughes.html

http://www.robertfrost.org/indexgood.html

Cited: Baym, Nina. "The Norton Anthology of American Literature." 2003 http://www.redhotjazz.com/hughes.html http://www.robertfrost.org/indexgood.html