{"id":99,"date":"2025-08-16T18:01:32","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T18:01:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/fys-pinsker\/?page_id=99"},"modified":"2025-12-03T14:42:47","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T14:42:47","slug":"maya-angelou-still-i-rise-1978","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/fys-pinsker\/texts\/maya-angelou-still-i-rise-1978\/","title":{"rendered":"Maya Angelou, \u201cStill I Rise\u201d (1978)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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INTRODUCTION<\/h3>\n
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Maya Angelou (Smithsonian<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Maya Angelou<\/a> (1928\u20132014) was a writer and poet who had a remarkably varied career.\u00a0 She was born in St. Louis and grew up in Missouri and Arkansas.\u00a0 She struggled to overcome difficult circumstances in the 1930s and 1940s, before becoming an aspiring poet in the 1950s.\u00a0 She joined the civil rights movement and worked with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. and also spent time overseas in the Middle East and Africa and during the 1960s.\u00a0 She is perhaps best known for her first autobiographical work, a searing memoir:\u00a0 I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings\u00a0<\/em>(1969).\u00a0 Later she became a college professor and renowned public intellectual who authored several books.\u00a0 Angelou delivered an inaugural poem for President Bill Clinton in 1993.\u00a0 Angelou wrote “Still I Rise” in the 1970s while living in Oakland, California.\u00a0 It soon became an anthem for many people.\u00a0 Nelson Mandela read the poem while in prison in South Africa and later recited it when he was inaugurated as the country’s president in 1994.\u00a0 Serena Williams also famously invoked the poem and Angelou’s influence during critical moments in her groundbreaking tennis career.\u00a0 Angelou died in 2014.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Still I Rise<\/strong><\/h3>\n

You may write me down in history<\/span>
\nWith your bitter, twisted lies,<\/span>
\nYou may trod me in the very dirt<\/span>
\nBut still, like dust, I\u2019ll rise.<\/span><\/p>\n

Does my sassiness upset you?<\/span>
\nWhy are you beset with gloom?<\/span>
\n\u2019Cause I walk like I\u2019ve got oil wells<\/span>
\nPumping in my living room.<\/span>
\nJust like moons and like suns,<\/span>
\nWith the certainty of tides,<\/span>
\nJust like hopes springing high,<\/span>
\nStill I\u2019ll rise.<\/span><\/p>\n

Did you want to see me broken?<\/span>
\nBowed head and lowered eyes?<\/span>
\nShoulders falling down like teardrops,<\/span>
\nWeakened by my soulful cries?<\/span><\/p>\n

Does my haughtiness offend you?<\/span>
\nDon\u2019t you take it awful hard<\/span>
\n\u2019Cause I laugh like I\u2019ve got gold mines<\/span>
\nDiggin\u2019 in my own backyard.<\/span><\/p>\n

You may shoot me with your words,<\/span>
\nYou may cut me with your eyes,<\/span>
\nYou may kill me with your hatefulness,<\/span>
\nBut still, like air, I\u2019ll rise.<\/span><\/p>\n

Does my sexiness upset you?<\/span>
\nDoes it come as a surprise<\/span>
\nThat I dance like I\u2019ve got diamonds<\/span>
\nAt the meeting of my thighs?<\/span><\/p>\n

Out of the huts of history\u2019s shame<\/span>
\nI rise<\/span>
\nUp from a past that\u2019s rooted in pain<\/span>
\nI rise<\/span>
\nI\u2019m a black ocean, leaping and wide,<\/span>
\nWelling and swelling I bear in the tide.<\/span><\/p>\n

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear<\/span>
\nI rise<\/span>
\nInto a daybreak that\u2019s wondrously clear<\/span>
\nI rise<\/span>
\nBringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,<\/span>
\nI am the dream and the hope of the slave.<\/span>
\nI rise<\/span>
\nI rise<\/span>
\nI rise.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n