The “Bean Eaters” by Gwendolyn Brooks
The “Bean Eaters” by Gwendolyn Brooks is a very deep poem. The first
impression it gives is that it is about a couple. Maybe a couple that has lived their
whole life together in poverty but in happiness. This couple has lived its life
together but without any material well-being. “Dinner is a casual affair” because
dinner it something they have to eat to survive. And though this dinner is very
poor, nevertheless the life of this pair has all the components that should be
remembered: “beads and receipts and dolls and cloths, tobacco crumbs, vases and
fringes”. It is full of the things that were important to the couple, and were dear to
it.
It is a poem that tells how little our bodies need to life and at the same time how
deep out soul can be. It says: “You do not need to be rich and eat the most
exquisite food to reveal your inner world and what you actually feel”. “Beans” is a
cheap meal but nevertheless is a meal that can connect the life of two people for
ever and can make them happy. Even if you eat more than “beans” it does not
guarantee you happiness. But sometimes it is “beans” that make you remember
what is the most important thing in life – to live and to be happy with what you
have got.
“Beans” are needed to continue the life of poor people, but bring so poor they are
still able to be happy and get alder together. “Two who are Mostly Good” – these
two people have not done anything bad in their life but the search of the product of
survival. They survived, they are not rich, but they are happy. People who can
depend on “beans” are really mostly good, because people that depend on “caviar”
are perverted and sick. The “bean eaters” are happy with little things and do not
need anything extraordinary to be really honestly happy. They “put on their
clothes” and “put things away” as mature people. This is the natural course of
things. The “bean eaters” have a rented room but they still manage to be
“twinkling” like stars. They are pure in their feelings and are able to leave the
things that bother them as they are strong as a couple.
This poem is simple. It is a simple poem about poor people. They are the “bean
eaters” but they are full of happy memories. Poorness has not stopped them from
being happy and having the most sweet life and most sincere relationship in the
world. These people are poor but they are not giving up, they continue to life and
in spite of their “beans” they still eat their memories. Their life if remembering
what they have been through, what they have experienced and what they have
survived. They have faced different things: the good and the bad (the tasty and the
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disgusting). Nevertheless, their memories are the tastiest thing in the whole wide
world. Yes, they eat “beans” but they are happy as the most wealthy people on
Earth.
The Bean Eaters by Gwendolyn Brooks: Summary and Analysis
Gwendolyn Brooks is a renowned Black female poet who penned this short poem
called The Bean Eaters in 1960. She has successfully created the picture of a
couple who are socially isolated and in a dire economic condition. She has used
jazz rhythm in this poem and breaks the traditional syntax of so called white
discipline, morality and goodness.
In this short lyric, Gwendolyn Brooks is describing the life pattern of the old
yellow pair who has rented the back room. Probably, they might have rented the
back for the cheap rent. Moreover, their room is congested. They are shown in the
dinner table eating cheap dinner of beans. They look around and notice beans,
breads, dolls, receipts, tobacco crumbs, vases, fringes in the same room. They have
kept all the things together and this keeping together also reflects their poverty.
Moreover, there are many other images in the poem which reflect their poverty.
Most of the time, they eat the beans only and dinner has become their causal
affairs. That is to say, they eat dinners occasionally. They might take dinner to
mark the festive occasion. The occasional nature of dinner and bean as their part of
the schedule also highlight their poverty. The qualities of utensils, particularly tin
flatware and plain chipware also contribute to the same impression.
Despite this, poverty this old yellow pair has mostly lived their life with goodness
and virtues and been ‘Mostly Good’. Their life has gone being good. And the
repeated use of word 'remembering' makes us think seriously about their
achievement. They might have thought about what they got being good. They
couldn’t get anything out of their virtues. From this point of view, this word
'remembering' review the so called white lecture of morality, virtues, and
goodness. The poem basically focuses on the word, remembering, which may have
the double implication. First, they may have remembered how many bad people in
their community have been living the prosperous life; they didn’t need the virtue of
any kind. Second, more specifically they might have been recalling the days when
they had eaten the whole meal.
In the thorough reading of the poem, it seems to be the analysis of the poverty but
if the old yellow pair stands for the black, it represents the stories of the black. The
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white society always demands morality and virtue in the part of the blacks but
ignores their suffering.
Though the poem is short, it is packed with symbols and metaphors. The setting in
the back room with low cost dinnerware and creaking table metaphorically
suggests that the old couples are poor and live in a pathetic place. As the setting is
poor and nothing especial is noticeable in the poem, it could be symbolic to the
characters of the poem who are old, poor, boring and nothing extraordinary feature
is related with them. The less excitement of the setting is directly related to the
excite less life of the old people who have nothing to do except waiting for death.
The title of the poem is also symbolic which signify the poverty of the couple.
Beans are generally cheap food which this old fellows dine most of the time, so
they are mentioned here as ‘The Bean Eaters.’ The cheap wares, creaking wood,
beads, tobacco crumbs all symbolically speak as the poor and distressing state of
the old couple.
Similarly, some strong imagery are used to create the picture of the couple: ‘yellow
pair’, ‘mostly good’, ‘lived their days’ and ‘keep on’. These imagery richly tell us
about the old couple who had been good to others are now grown very old and
waiting for the death in a poor state. Their age and poverty is again reinforced in
this imagery.
If this poem is analyzed in terms of racial point of view, it gives the clear picture of
the Afro-American people whose condition in old age turns out to be very pathetic.
The poet shares some painful social discrimination in a very simple tone. Though
they have been good throughout their life, have followed the so called white
discipline and morality, they are now in a poor condition just left with beans to be
eaten. Their all the contributions have been forgotten by the whites and they are in
the isolated place of the back room with the memories of the past only. They might
have lost their kids or their kids have been separated from them by the whites, so
they don’t have any support even in the old times of their life. The ‘old yellow
pair’ here suggest the turning of the old couple into yellowish due to deficiency of
nutritious food. By using Jazz rhythm and breaking the traditional Syntax the poet
metaphorically might be trying to go out of so called white discipline, morality and
goodness.
Examples of Poetic Devices in the Poem 'The Bean Eaters'
Rhyme & Rhythm
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“The Bean Eaters” by Gwendolyn Brooks is a short poem with only 11 lines. The
poetic devices that Brooks uses in “The Bean Eaters” shed light on poverty and
give the reader a brief guided tour of an elderly couple’s humble life.
Imagery and Symbolism
Instead of filling the lines of “The Bean Eaters” with descriptions of despair and
isolation, Brooks offers enough imagery to paint a picture of an old couple living
in the back room of a home and their socioeconomic situation. She talks about the
couple eating off chipped plates, using cheap flatware made of tin and dinner being
a “casual affair.” Brooks writes that the couple spend their time putting things -like dolls, beads, receipts, cloth and vases – away, giving the reader a sense of
being in a small, crowded room filled with knickknacks. In addition to being a
food that a reader may associate with poverty, the beans in the poem allude to the
things that the couple do not have, like a bigger home, a bigger family, finer
possessions and perhaps friends. The poet shares with the reader that the couple is
old and yellow. However, she doesn’t explain if “yellow,” for example, is a racial
reference, implies cowardice, describes the color of their clothes or is a health
condition.
Rhyme and Meter
Just as the dinner in “The Bean Eaters” is casual, so is the rhyme scheme: AABA
BCDC EFDF. While the poem resembles common meter because the second and
fourth lines rhyme, it doesn’t have a formal, organized meter or even a metrical
pattern. The lack of meter reflects the simplicity of the couple in the poem and
their straightforward, familiar lives.
Use of Repetition
The first and 11th lines in “The Bean Eaters” talk about the old couple eating
beans. The repetition implies that beans are a staple in the couple’s diet because of
their financial circumstances, not necessarily choice. Brooks uses the word “two”
twice in a row, in the first lines of the second stanza. The repetition of the number
tells the reader that the couple are a party of two and that they are the only
members of their social circle. Brooks also repeats the word “remembering” twice
in the last stanza, giving the reader the impression that the couple’s entertainment
comes from reminiscing about their past “with twinklings and twinges.”
Allusion to ‘The Potato Eaters’
In the late 1800s, Vincent Van Gogh created a painting called “The Potato Eaters.”
The painting depicts a family eating potatoes for dinner in a small, dark and
crowded room. Van Gogh based the painting on a poor family of miners that he
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knew who had skin that resembled a dry, dusty potato after a day of work. (See
Reference 4) The EMC Paradigm website notes that Van Gogh’s “The Potato
Eaters” was the inspiration behind Brooks’ “The Bean Eaters.” Both works portray
the hardships endured by minorities and the working poor.
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