18 pages • 36 minutes read
Childhood
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Symbols & Motifs
Red
Red as a symbol in “Childhood” represents the violence, destruction, illness, and difficulty the people of this community faced. The color red permeates the entire first stanza of the poem. Beginning with the “red miners” in Line 1, the speaker characterizes the miners by the color of the dirt they worked in, which changed their skin and clothing to red. The red clay also colored the land, represented by the “red hills” in Line 3 and the camps where the miners lived (“their camps / dyed with red dust from the Ishkooda mines” [Lines 3-4]). These early images of red indicate that the mine permeated the entire community, from where people lived to the color of the people’s skin.
As a symbol, red isn’t used in the second stanza. Rather, Walker’s speaker uses other words, symbols, and concepts that reiterate the color red. As a color, red typically symbolizes passion and anger. In Line 13, the poem recognizes that the community was consistently rocked by the “sentiment and hatred” (Line 13) that “still held sway” (Line 13). The use of “hatred” (Line 13) indicates anger, frustration, fervor and passion. Line 14 returns to the concept of the land: “and only bitter land was washed away” (Line 14).
The Ishkooda mines were historically known for a low quality of living, disease, illness, and violence. The final image of the red dirt washing away also represents the washing away of blood. The miners, who wore the red dirt on their skin, were also washed away with disease, illness, and death, as mining is a risky occupation with little to no workers’ rights. In “Childhood,” red is a symbol for the violence and death that the harsh conditions of the mines placed on the community.
Bitter Land
Similar to the symbol of red, the symbol of the “bitter land” (Line 14) in the poem’s final line, stands for the land the miners worked and the terrible working conditions they endured. Defined as bitter, the mines were where the miners spent most of their hours. The land is bitter because it represents the dissatisfaction of the men working the land. This is reiterated at the end of the first stanza when the speaker states they heard “grumbling undermining all their words” (Line 8).
Land in “Childhood” is negatively depicted because it is the source and location of the mines. Mining, which is known to be dangerous and cause many fatal diseases, occurs directly inside the earth. Land, therefore, becomes a symbol for the work the men do. Because the men are bitter about the long hours, low pay, and unfair working conditions, the bitter land represents their feelings toward the mining job.
The symbol of the bitter in Stanza 2 is also represented in the “low cotton country” (Line 9) and scenes of poverty (“stumps or trees, and croppers’ rotting shacks” [Line 11]). The land in “Childhood” is far from abundant or giving. Instead, it is something that causes pain, dissatisfaction, and feelings of defeat.
Night
Night in “Childhood” is introduced in Line 5 when the speaker reflects on how “[n]ight after night [they] met them on the roads, / or on the streets” (Lines 5-6). Night represents darkness, a feeling of depression, and lack of safety. Mines are known for being dark even during the day. Therefore, by recounting the memory of meeting the miners at night, the speaker reinforces two things. First, the miners worked long hours. Second, the use of night in the poem reinforces the amount of darkness the miner’s experienced in their life. Not only was it dark within the mines where they worked all day but also when they emerged from the mines after a day of work it was already night. Night as a symbol stands for the persistent darkness the miners lived in.
Lastly, the symbol of night also represents the speaker’s own lack of safety. By wandering around as a child at night, the speaker insinuates there was little to no parental guidance or protection. A child walking alone among miners walking in the streets is unsafe. As a symbol, the use of night in the first stanza reinforces the depressed area, the lack of parental oversight, and the miners’ dark life, which hardly (if ever) touched the hope and possibility of daylight. The lack of light in the poem further indicates the lack of hope in the town and in the speaker’s childhood.
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By Margaret Walker
