Everyone knows the popular phrase “You can’t judge a book by its cover”. People can express
certain feeling on the outside in order to mask the true feelings on the inside. One of the most common
ways of showing feelings on the outside is smiling. There are many everyday situation that require
people to put a smile on their face. It could be an employee who hates their job and has to put on a
smile for his or her face for their superiors in order to stay employed. Nonetheless, in the 19th century,
African American slaves had to put smiles on their faces in order to stay alive. The poem “We Wear the
Mask”, wri-en by Paul Laurence Dunbar, is a re0ec#on of how everyday life was for slave in America. A
mask is a covering that’s hides a person’s face to keep their identity a secret. In this poem, a mask is a
metaphor for a smiling or a happy face. Slaves had to pretend to be happy in order to please their
owners and to make their everyday lives a li-le bit easier. Dunbar himself was never a slave but both of
his parent were. Growing up in Ohio, which was a “free” state, Dunbar was cognizant of the experiences
his parents and others had endure while they were slaves.
We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtle#es.
In stanza one, we are told what the mask is and what it’s covering up. It’s a mask of a phony,
insincere smile that is concealing tremendous heart-ache, pain and su6ering within the slaves. Many
