Africa by David Diop Analysis
David Diop expresses his great affection, disappointment, and excitement for Africa. The poet accomplishes this by praising and admiring Africa as his homeland, regretting Africa's oppression, and expressing his profound hopes for the future Africa has yet to attain. In the poem, the poet employs a variety of symbols, imagery, repetition, and personification. This is Africa by David Diop analysis.
Because the persona of the poem has been calling out the name of his motherland, the tone utilized in the opening four lines is proud. He spoke it multiple times to emphasize the term, and he even claimed it with the word 'my' even though he had never been there and just heard about it from his grandmother's song. It was a land of 'proud warriors from ancestral savannahs', he said. While the poet says on lines 5 and 6 that he does not recognize the nation because he grew raised in a different place, but he cannot deny the fact that his blood is African.
His African ancestry is reflected in the 'beautiful black blood' that runs through his veins, demonstrating his passion for Africa and its people. The following stanzas are enraged and accusing, focusing on the fact that it is his kin's blood and sweat that is flooding the fields to support others. By doing so, he is pointing a finger at colonialists who oppressed Black people and used them as slaves to profit from their labor.
Because of what happened to his motherland, he is experiencing deep grief. The reader is invited to empathize with the poet as he laments the loss of his beloved Africa in this section of the poem. In his poem, he emphasized how the ruthless and heartless colonists had colonized, slaved, humiliated, and tortured the African people for a long time. In these lines, he challenges the African people to confront the oppression and humiliation they experience in their own country. He encourages them to remember their forefathers' majestic qualities and to fight injustice in any form. Despite their endurance, he encourages them to remain firm and unbent, refusing to let their agony break them.
Finally, the persona believes that Africa will one day be able to break free from the oppression of others. That they will one day succeed in obtaining the bitter taste of liberty. The poet has depicted Africa as a tree that, against many obstacles, would give fruits and flowers again; similarly, the poet has depicted Africa as a land whose people would rise despite much anguish and torture in various ways. The land would gradually prosper, much like the fruits of the tree, and eventually taste liberty.
The last section of the poem introduces the transitioning finale of the lamentation, which shifts from expressing emotions coming from Africa's condition to questioning the future and fate of this region, The poet speaks in a mystical tone, as though his concerns and attitude toward Africa are overly negative, and that Africa's future appears to be more promising than he is capable of comprehending at the moment. This may be seen when Diop states that Africa's young shoots grow their fruits of liberation through patience and persistence. The poem concludes with the poet creating a hopeful, beautiful image of his ancestral home, which, despite the challenges it faces, is on its way to a bright future. Diop uses personification as a method to reinforce Africa's humanity across the continent. The poet used the phrases my, you, and your to speak directly to or about the continent, which provides it with life, identity, and emotions.
In conclusion, the poem showed all of the injustices perpetrated against Africans. However, because of the people's love for their nation, despite the humiliation and pains they have endured, they will persevere patiently and obstinately. David Diop's goal is to send a message of hope and resistance to the continent's people. He also used the first-person point of view to express his affection for and patriotism for his adopted homeland.
