On June 27, 1872, the United States was emerging from the chains of slavery and a child, Paul Laurence Dunbar, was born. His parents are African Americans or known at the time as freed slaves, who faced many racial hardships. Paul Laurence Dunbar became a famous poet, regardless of the difficulties he faced in his life, and one of his poems is "We Wear the Mask", which reflects how resilient he is in life and expresses how dark reality was at the time. We say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Paul Laurence Dunbar's life begins with his parents and what they went through. “Many of their experiences of life as slaves and on the plantations influenced Dunbar's later writings” (Paul Laurence Dunbar). Previously, his father, Joshua, had volunteered in the civil war while his mother, Matilda, was already married. However, their life was not comfortable with the end of the Civil War and they did not get along with Joshua failing to get a stable job becoming an alcoholic leaving Matilda to divorce him. However, Matlida, realizing her son's talent towards writing, made sure to leave him with an education instead of working. Thanks to his mother's efforts, Dunbar completed all his studies even though he was the only African American in his class. This must have had a harsh impact on him as children look to adults and his friends in due course realizing that his color treated him differently. While Dunbar may have faced such treatment, it did not stop him from becoming editor of his high school newspaper and publishing his poems in local newspapers. After graduating from high school, he wanted to go to college or journalism but was denied, and he began working as an elevator operator to support himself. However, this did not stop him from reading or writing, and his former teacher made him give a poetic speech. This earned him praise and influenced him to self-publish his work. He gained support, like Frederick Douglass, and a benefactor to publish the second work that earned him national fame. Then he began doing public readings, went on tour to London, and worked at the Library of Congress; but he fell ill with pneumonia. He turned to alcohol and lived the rest of his life at home with his mother while continuing to write. Paul Laurence Dunbar died on February 9, 1906. Dunbar is stubborn about what he wants to do, regardless of the racial restrictions he faced, such as how he continued to write and read without furthering his education. He seems to have a trait of resilience, and this can be seen in his poem "We Wear the Mask". The first line begins with the title and ends with “grins and lies” (Dunbar). This is a personification, but the title in the first line indicates the importance of the test that everyone is faking while the ending implies how a person survives. It might be a ghost why someone would wear a mask, but as Dunbar, it's his reality from how he had to go to school every day without caring about how he looked or how he was treated. The rest of these lines that make up the first stanza showcase more imagery such as “bleeding hearts, we smile” or “mouth with a myriad of subtleties.” It all highlights the pain in Dunbar's heart of having to give up his dream job every day or pretend that everything is fine even though hate is in every corner. This also reflects on the entire black community where there is some kind of racial laws that force, regardless of the age of the person, to follow unless they want to.