Analysing 'Half-Caste' by John Agard

'Half-Caste' by John Agard

            Half Caste is one of the most famous poems about racism lately. As we know, John Agard wrote it. In this poem, we can feel the emotion of him talking about racism and the difference of color between people. He describes natural and beautiful things that are 'half-half' and he shows us that they are beautiful anyway. This poem reflects his anger against all of the people who have called them half-caste throughout his life in Britain. He was called a half-caste because he had a Caribbean father and a Portuguese mother, so they said he wasn’t ''pure''. The tone of this poem is very unusual but powerful at the same time because he talks as if he wasn't very intelligent and this makes the poem more interesting. We can evidence this when he always uses the rhetorical question 'Explain yuself / wha yu mean / when yu say half-caste'. The purpose of this is to make the reader be more interested about the poem and also to make the audience feel connected to the fact that there are some people who talk like that and it seems like a 'mixture, but they are humans anyway.

            The fact that John Agard uses contrast between the racist term and something beautiful such as the weather of a piano symphony makes us think about how every human being should be treated the same way. When Agard writes 'yu mean tchaikovsky / sit down at dah piano / and mix a black key / wid a white key / is a half-caste symphony?' The evidence of this is to see how the human mind is always trying to be better than others and also the fixed paradigm about superiority. The mean reason he uses dialect 'Explain yuself' is to show that he has a Caribbean side of his life. With dialect we are able to see that he is angry of being called half-caste but also that he is not embarrassed of admitting that he has two different cultures in his past. The use of metaphors in Half-Caste is the main element of writing. He uses metaphors to compare half-caste to music, weather and art. For example, we compares half-caste to weather when he says 'yu mean when Picasso / mix red and green / is a half caste canvas?'. This means that Agard wants to ask us if having two different parts makes people or thing be incomplete or without importance. The line breaks in this poem are interesting because it give each line importance and a pause that blends perfectly with the next line, as we can see when John says 'Explain yuself / wha yu mean / when you say half-caste'.  The use of the retorical question 'explain yuself' makes us think that Agard is writing to us personally and that he is clamming for an answer.

            The rhythm of this poem gives it an element that makes the reading interesting. The line breaks are the most important part of the rhythm because we can see clearly each idea that John Agard wants us to thing about. There is almost no rhyme in the poem but for example when he says 'in fact some o dem cloud / half-caste till dem overcast / so spiteful dem don't want de / sun pass / ah rass?' we can see that there is evidence of rhyme and that he talks about the weather in London.

            In conclusion, my impression of the poem is that Agard was very brave in order to talk like that to all of the people that have been mean to him in the present and in his past years. Also the fact that he compared racism to beautiful things makes us think that we should be tolerant and that all human beings are exactly the same. It doesn’t matter if you are black or white, or if you have two different cultures, what really matter is for the whole world to be united and to be able to share and respect our similars. After reading this, my paradigm about racism is bigger, so now I know that people feel terrible when they are called mean names or worse things.