Heritage by Countée Cullen
"Heritage" by Countée Cullen is a renowned introspective lyric poem that delves into complex themes of identity, alienation, and cultural disconnect. Spanning 128 lines, it presents the inner turmoil of a young individual grappling with their African heritage, shaped by the historical context of enslavement in the United States. The poem begins with expressions of profound alienation, as the speaker acknowledges their lack of authentic connection to Africa, relying instead on vivid images and stereotypes often found in early 20th-century literature.
Cullen crafts a rich tapestry of visual details, depicting Africa's landscapes and its people in picturesque yet conflicted terms. As the speaker reflects on their Christian faith, they wrestle with feelings of doubt and the implications of racial discrimination that challenge their spiritual beliefs. The work employs rhythmic couplets and a hypnotic quality reminiscent of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven," enhancing the speaker's exploration of their existential crisis.
Throughout "Heritage," Cullen skillfully balances contrasting imagery, illustrating the speaker’s struggle between cultural identity and societal expectations. The poem serves as a poignant reflection on the inner conflicts faced by individuals navigating the complexities of race, faith, and personal history. This profound exploration invites readers to share in the speaker's crisis of conscience, highlighting the broader themes of heritage and belonging.
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Heritage by Countée Cullen
First published: 1925, in Color
Type of poem: Lyric
The Poem
Countée Cullen’s “Heritage,” a long (128-line) and intensely introspective lyric poem, has been considered a classic since it first appeared in print. The poem can be read as a soliloquy or monologue of a studious but deeply troubled young person who is tormented by the effort to reconcile his inner desires and the decorous behavior expected of him. The first ten lines of the poem express the speaker’s profound feeling of alienation. He is of African ancestry but, as a descendant of people enslaved centuries ago in what is now the United States, he has no actual knowledge of Africa. Because his impressions of the continent and its cultures are limited to images derived from his reading and imagination, the first half of the poem (lines 1-63) constructs a vision of Africa through a series of beautiful, picturesque details: “wild barbaric birds,” feral lions and leopards stalking gentle antelopes, herds of elephants parading through the open savannah grasslands. African people are depicted in equally picturesque terms as savage but regal, beautiful and carefree, lovers unashamed of their nakedness. In choosing such images, Cullen deliberately draws upon the view of Africa that would be familiar to his readers since it was a view reflected in the popular press during the first decades of the twentieth century.
Against this vivid visual backdrop, the speaker imagines that he hears the drums of some unknown tribal ritual temptingly calling to him. He understands, however, that it is only his imagination at work, that the drumming is merely his own pulse. Yet rain beating outside his window again reminds him of drums, bidding him to worship “Quaint, outlandish gods.” As the poem progresses, the speaker begins to doubt his own faith as a Christian, finding it especially difficult to maintain a faith based on “the golden rule” and to assume the meek and forgiving role preached in Luke 6:20-49 by Jesus Christ. Risking blasphemy, the speaker wonders how a god who is not also black could understand the humiliation and pain that he must face resulting the racial discrimination that epitomizes American society.
In the end, the speaker struggles to remind himself that he is indeed a professing Christian, a “civilized” and intellectual Western man—no longer really related to the free, regal, but “unsaved” Africans of antiquity. The reader of the poem has also been deeply involved in the speaker’s crisis of conscience and cannot help but appreciate the profound dilemma of religious faith and social identity that reading “Heritage” has required him or her to share.
Forms and Devices
“Heritage” is meant to be read aloud. Cullen’s poem, though carefully constructed in rhymed couplets, nevertheless recalls the hypnotic metrical effect of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven” (1845). That poem—itself based on the meter of a poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning—employed subject matter, rhyme, and meter in a manner calculated to induce a sense of anxiety in readers or listeners. “The Raven,” therefore, provided a suitable model for the narrative repetition that marks Cullen’s own exploration of the physical state of insomnia and the mood of anxious doubt.
Cullen meticulously crafts simple rhyming couplets for his seven-syllable line. The skillful employment of alliteration and assonance (repetition of the same vowel sound) adds to the poem’s syncopated rhythmic effect. A good example of this technique is found in lines 23-25:
So I lie, whose fount of pride,
Cullen’s fidgety word music and emphasis on kinetic and visual imagery effectively highlights the discrepancy between the speaker’s uncomfortable awareness of his physical being and his conflicted spiritual yearnings. The pivot upon which “Heritage” turns is the repeated phrase “so I lie,” which requires different inflections according to context. Sometimes the phrase connotes the speaker’s restless inactivity and sometimes his awareness of his own spiritual duplicity in claiming a religion in which he might not truly believe.
The poetic images and rhetorical structure of “Heritage”—often actually in opposition to each other—are carefully balanced in order to reinforce the author’s message. The beautiful African python shedding its skin annually so that it can grow is balanced by the insistent tribal drums bidding the speaker to take off the buttoned-up suit and vest that simultaneously denote his status as an educated middle-class Werstern man and the repression of his deepest instincts and desires. Like the snake, his natural impulse is to shed this constricting covering—yet, in this case, that act would represent not growth but rather regression to an uncivilized pagan condition. Similarly, the speaker’s difficult-to-control inner urges are presented using images having to do with flood and fire, suggesting that his subconscious desires are akin to subterranean volcanic forces that would cause chaos should they erupt. Throughout the poem Cullen avoids using abstractions by grounding his rhetoric, even his references to emotions, in sensory perceptions or tangible things.
Bibliography
Cullen, Countée. My Soul’s High Song: The Collected Writings of Countée Cullen, Voice of the Harlem Renaissance. Edited by Gerald Early. New York: Anchor Books, 1991.
Fetrow, Fred M. “Cullen’s ’Yet Do I Marvel.’” Explicator 56, no. 2 (Winter, 1998): 103-106.
Goldweber, David E. “Cullen, Keats, and the Privileged Liar.” Papers on Language and Literature 38, no. 1 (Winter, 2002): 29-49.
Lomax, Michael L. “Countée Cullen: A Key to the Puzzle.” In The Harlem Renaissance Re-examined, edited by Victor A. Kramer. New York: AMS Press, 1987.
Powers, Peter. “’The Singing Man Who Must Be Reckoned With’: Private Desire and Public Responsibility in the Poetry of Countée Cullen.” African American Review 34, no. 4 (Winter, 2000): 661-679.
Shucard, Alan R. Countée Cullen. Boston: Twayne, 1984.
Turner, Darwin T. “Countée Cullen: The Lost Ariel.” In In a Minor Chord: Three African American Writers and Their Search for Identity. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1971.