"Middle Passage" is a poem by

Robert Hayden Robert Hayden (August 4, 1913February 25, 1980) was an American poet, essayist, and educator. He served as Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1976 to 1978, a role today known as US Poet Laureate. He was the first African-Americ ...

. Hayden first published the poem in 1945 and revised it in 1962.

Background and publication

The American poet

started researching with the intent of writing his poem in the late 1930s and started to write "Middle Passage" in 1941 and sought to include it in '' The Black Spear'', an "epic sequence" of poetry inspired by

Stephen Vincent Benét Stephen Vincent Benét ( ; July 22, 1898 – March 13, 1943) was an American poet, short story writer, and novelist. He wrote a book-length narrative poem of the American Civil War, '' John Brown's Body'', published in 1928, for which he receive ...

's work '' John Brown’s Body''. Hayden based the poem in part on ''

The Waste Land ''The Waste Land'' is a poem by T. S. Eliot, widely regarded as one of the most important English-language poems of the 20th century and a central work of modernist poetry. Published in 1922, the 434-line poem first appeared in the United ...

'' by

T. S. Eliot Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 18884 January 1965) was a poet, essayist and playwright.Bush, Ronald. "T. S. Eliot's Life and Career", in John A Garraty and Mark C. Carnes (eds), ''American National Biography''. New York: Oxford University ...

. He first published the poem in ''

Phylon ''Phylon'' (subtitle: ''the Clark Atlanta University Review of Race and Culture'') is a semi-annual peer-reviewed academic journal covering culture in the United States from an African-American perspective. It was established in 1940 by W. E. B. D ...

'' in 1945. He significantly revised it for publication in his 1962 ''A Ballad of Remembrance''. "Middle Passage" is the "centerpiece" of ''A Ballad of Remembrance'', and that collection is considered to have played a large role in increasing Hayden's reputation as a poet. It was then republished in several of Hayden's other anthologies with minor revisions, including ''Selected Poems'' (1966) and ''Angle of Ascent'' (1975).

Content and revision

Hayden said that in writing the poem he sought to “contribute toward an understanding of what our frican-Americanpast had really been like”. He was likely influenced by the recent

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

and

The Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

. "Middle Passage" follows the

transatlantic slave trade The Atlantic slave trade or transatlantic slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of Slavery in Africa, enslaved African people to the Americas. European slave ships regularly used the triangular trade route and its Middle Pass ...

and is focused on the events surrounding the mutiny on ''

La Amistad ''La Amistad'' (; Spanish for ''The Friendship'') was a 19th-century two-masted schooner owned by a Spaniard living in Cuba. It became renowned in July 1839 for a slave revolt by Mende captives who had been captured and sold to European slav ...

'' in July 1839. Hayden sought to redefine African-American history through his poem. The original version of the poem has some typographical errors and mistakes in how it was

set Set, The Set, SET or SETS may refer to: Science, technology, and mathematics Mathematics *Set (mathematics), a collection of elements *Category of sets, the category whose objects and morphisms are sets and total functions, respectively Electro ...

. In revising the poem, Hayden made it around forty-three lines shorter.

Reception

Most critical analysis has focused on Hayden's revised version of "Middle Passage". While ''A Ballad of Remembrance'' received relatively little note upon publication, scholarly attention grew in the years that followed, winning the 1966 '' Grand Prix de la Poésie'' at the first

World Festival of Negro Arts The World Festival of Black Arts (French: ''Festival Mondial des Arts Nègres''), also known as FESMAN or FMAN, has been a series of month-long culture and arts festivals taking place in various parts of Africa. The festival features participant ...

. The poem has generally been well received. It has been described as an "anti-

epic Epic commonly refers to: * Epic poetry, a long narrative poem celebrating heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation * Epic film, a genre of film defined by the spectacular presentation of human drama on a grandiose scale Epic(s) ...

" for taking many key features present in epic poetry and inverting them.

References

{{Reflist 1945 poems African-American poetry Works about the Atlantic slave trade