... her career as a professional writer. "The unsettled life Angelou writes of in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, suggests a sense of self as perpetually in the process of becoming, of dying, and being reborn, in all its ramifications"(Ryan 13) . Angelou ends I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings with the birth of her son, Guy. The caged bird at the end is comical and triumphant. When asked why she characterized the caged bird as triumphant, Maya replied with the obvious response, "I have won in ... this day. Angelou states in an interview "Religion is an important theme through out the Caged Bi...

• Word Count: 2988
• Approx Pages: 12
• Grade Level: High School

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is an autobiographical account about Maya Angelou's challenging life and encounter of an American society at a crucial period, a time of adjustment. Both as a woman and black person, she is confronted to many difficulties and is victim of racial segregation. This belongs to the main theme of the novel, Maya's fight to endure and break through in an intricate and harsh world. At a very ... self-esteem in a society that makes things complicated for her. Maya Angelou compares herself as a caged bird, one that always sings, although it is trapped in a caged. The cag...

• Word Count: 469
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: High School

Maya Angelou writes on her experience living in Southern rural then in Los Angeles and San Francisco, the book is a heartwarming yet tragic story of her life from birth to young adulthood. She grew in unstable home environment, moving between her grandmother, father, and mother with her brother Bailey. She was sexually molested by her mother's boyfriend at the age of eight that made her shut off from the world and spoke only to Bailey for years, until her teacher helped her come out of the silence after which she moved to California. She says, "If growing up is painful for the Southern Black g...

• Word Count: 649
• Approx Pages: 3
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate