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    A Study Guide for Bernard Dadie's "Dry Your Tears, Africa"
    A Study Guide for Bernard Dadie's "Dry Your Tears, Africa"
    A Study Guide for Bernard Dadie's "Dry Your Tears, Africa"
    Ebook38 pages27 minutes

    A Study Guide for Bernard Dadie's "Dry Your Tears, Africa"

    By Gale and Cengage

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    About this ebook

    A Study Guide for Bernard Dadie's "Dry Your Tears, Africa," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Poetry for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Poetry for Students for all of your research needs.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCengage Learning - Gale
    Release dateSep 28, 2016
    ISBN9781535822275
    A Study Guide for Bernard Dadie's "Dry Your Tears, Africa"

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      A Study Guide for Bernard Dadie's "Dry Your Tears, Africa" - Gale

      13

      Dry Your Tears, Africa!

      Bernard Dadié

      1956

      Introduction

      The Ivorian writer Bernard Binlin Dadié included in his 1956 collection La ronde des jours a poem of appeal titled Sèche tes pleurs, which would be translated as Dry Your Tears, Africa! Dadié is one of the premier writers from Ivory Coast (officially called Coôte d'Ivoire) and, in the absence of literary contemporaries from his own nation, is often considered alongside writers from nearby Senegal, where he attended college and began shaping his literary vision. The era during which the poem was written was one of social unease and occasional violent conflict in the region; both Ivory Coast and Senegal were part of federated French West Africa, and both would gain independence peacefully in 1960.

      Through the 1950s, with political movements pushing the nations toward freedom from the subjugation and abasement inherent in French rule, voices like Dadié's served to stir the people's imaginations and help them envision proudly reclaiming the land that rightfully belonged to them. Dry Your Tears, Africa!, with its praise of the continent's natural beauty and its appeals to the land to cast away its sorrows, is a fine example of just such an inspirational poem. First appearing in English as translated by Donatus Ibe Nwoga in his compilation West African Verse: An Anthology (1967), Dadié's poem can also be found in Alan Lomax and Raoul Abdul's 3000 Years of Black Poetry (1970) and in The Heritage of African Poetry: An Anthology of Oral and Written Poetry (1985), edited by Isidore Okpewho.

      Author Biography

      Dadié was born in Assinie, Ivory Coast, in 1916. His father served in the military, including a stint in Tours, France, and then resigned to become a forester. The young Dadié, who would accompany his mother into the forest on trips gathering firewood, became enamored with the serene flora and fauna there, especially the colorful, musical birds. He would also spend time by the seaside as the fishermen cast their nets and sang through their work. He had three siblings, but they died when they were young.

      Around 1922, Dadié went to live with an uncle, Melantchi, in Bingerville, closer to the coastal capital of Abidjan, and his uncle instructed him in farmwork and fishing. He briefly attended

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