32 pages • 1 hour read
Langston HughesMother to Son
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1987A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Themes
Hardship as a Source of Wisdom
While the poem “Mother to Son” is a speech of encouragement for the speaker’s son, she spends most of the poem describing hardship. The speaker does not expound on the bountiful future that awaits her son if he continues his ascent, nor does she describe any kind of reward as the ultimate goal. In fact, she discusses no goal whatsoever; the poem is not concerned with rewards or ultimate goals. It is concerned with maintaining strength to endure the hard times. The speaker does not minimize the difficulty of this climb; suffering features more vividly than hope or perseverance. The speaker wants not only to inspire her son, but to describe her difficult life: “It’s had tacks in it, / And splinters” (Lines 4-5). She uses tacks and splinters as a metaphor for the obstacles she’s overcome and the pain these difficulties have caused her, like a needle or a splinter through the foot. However, rather than focusing only on active injury or affliction, the poem presents a vision of hardship that encompasses a totality of suffering, and the extended metaphor speaks also to the pain of deficit and privation. She describes places on the stairs with no carpet, nothing to cushion her steps on this rickety staircase: “And places with no carpet on the floor— / Bare” (Lines 5-6).
The varied descriptions of the stairs’ appearance and quality represent her multifaceted struggles. The speaker, as a Black American woman in the early 1920s, was facing racial, economic, and gender discrimination and oppression. Because of the war, she may have lost her child’s father or other men close to her. The poem is entirely metaphorical and never ventures into a literal narrative, and so the speaker never specifies exactly the hard times she faced, but tactile images are a powerful expression. This poem is honest and raw, depicting what the reader can infer is an often harrowing life. It is an ode to her struggle as opposed to a celebration of her reward. Her tribulation has given her the unique strength, wisdom, and experience to be an inspiration for her son. When she says, “Don’t you fall now— / For I’se still goin’, honey” (Lines 17-18), it is a testament to her struggles. The weight of her hardships is immense, and the poem positions the speaker as someone to be respected.
Perseverance and Moving Forward Despite an Unknown Destination
In “Mother to Son,” the speaker has a deep belief in the necessity of movement, and perseverance is that forward momentum. She cannot and does not promise that if a person keeps moving they will come to a better place, but she acknowledges that there are moments of joy and wonder along the way, “And reachin’ landin’s, / And turnin’ corners” (Lines 10-11). These are the only lines describing any kind of positive aspect of ascending the stairs. These landings are places of respite but can also represent new heights, embarking on another climb. Turning corners is a more apparent metaphor for overcoming something, experiencing a positive life change, or starting a new chapter in life. But the speaker never suggests this climb will end; it is ambiguous whether she believes there is an end or, if she does, whether she can even imagine it. However, her message is no less pressing for the lack of an explicitly defined goal. The speaker anticipates her son will struggle—and the whole of the poem evinces her ability to empathize with him—but tells him that even if he finds the ascent “kinder hard” (Line 16) He mustn’t “[…] turn back. / Don’t you set down on the steps” (Lines 14-15). The alternative to perseverance is despair.
The speaker doesn’t know what’s at the end of the climb or there even is an end. Her sole concern is forward movement, maintaining progress upward, and finding purpose in the climb. This typifies the kind of attitude that, 40 years later, would lead to the Civil Rights Movement and expand rights for women. While the speaker could not imagine the world we live in today, let alone the changes made 60 years ago, it is this forward momentum—an unceasing climb toward something better—that brings about progress and change.
Familial Support amidst Generational Suffering
Family is a principal element in Hughes’s “Mother to Son,” as the poem is directly addressed to the speaker’s son and imparts wisdom. The speaker passes down this advice and encouragement to her son as a way to help him be successful and inspire him. It is also a way to bond with him, telling him about her story and what her experiences have taught her. The speaker’s use of pet names throughout the poem, “son” (Line 1), “boy” (Line 14), and “honey” (Line 18), demonstrates her love for him and her desire to help him and bond with him. Ultimately, the poem is a mother’s love letter to her son. Her encouragement and lecturing are intended to maintain her son’s forward motion, keeping his spirits up while he traverses the rickety stairs himself. She honestly tells him what it has been like for her, but she uses symbolism in a way that he can understand: “And sometimes goin’ in the dark / Where there ain’t been no light” (Lines 12-13). Because the speaker is a Black woman in the 1920s, she would have faced discrimination and prejudice, making it difficult to trust people outside of her own circle. She knows that her son will have to navigate the same racist world that she did, and this makes her motherly advice even more special; it is advice that her son knows he can trust because it comes directly from someone who has gone through his same struggles. While “Mother to Son” celebrates this familial bonding, the celebration occurs in the context of generational suffering.
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