Assignment on the Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi

   The Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi Coates is all about two sons, a father, and a strange unlikely road to manhood. Ta-Nehisi tells everything about his life such as his friends, teachers, siblings, parents, and other individuals who surrounded him and were involved in his road to manhood. Actually, the black boy was not similar to other typical kids as his behaviour was influenced greatly by his environment. In the story, it can be seen that there is a struggle inside Ta-Nehisi. There are two sides which are clashing against each other in him – on one hand, his father who was responsible for giving him knowledge and street professors on the other hand. He was struggling to unite both of these sides.

            He felt passion, love, and anger simultaneously and they influenced him. He knew that his current way of living would not lead him to success and he needed to gain education but he could not bring himself to do it because he just did not like it. At school, behaviour was his key problem. For instance, he kicked his teacher because he believed that the teacher abused him. To him, real life was outside the classroom and within the school walls, there was no life and thus, there was no reason to stay at the school. Streets taught him quite important lessons and that is why he believed that attending streets was better. Just because he believed that street knowledge was better did not mean that he was stupid in any sense. His father occasionally provided him with books. In addition to just books, his father also gave him the knowledge he needed.

            Ta-Nehisi and his brother both were influenced greatly by their parents. For instance, although they did not like going to school and getting education from school, they entered universities in time. The reason why they believed that getting institutional education was necessary was because their parents persuaded them significantly. For hours, the parents conversed with the boys and explained how education was necessary. Finally, they understood that without education, it was not possible for them to achieve success.

            The reason why Paul, Ta-Nehisi’s father, persuaded his children to gain education was because he had grown up in poverty himself. He had experienced poverty and he knew how a person could get out of it. It was by gaining education and that is why he always told his children to gain education. Knowledge was necessary but formal education was essential and it could not be ignored. As explained above, the surroundings of Ta-Nehisi influenced his life significantly and his father was the main influential figure. He was responsible for keeping him on track. Actually, Paul had been a solder and his own father had a lot of children. Thus, he had to grow up in poverty. However, he had resolved that he would not let his own children grow up and experience poverty. With this goal, he persuaded and pushed his children to gain education (Coates).

Works Cited of The Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi

Coates, Ta-Nehisi. The beautiful struggle: A memoir. Random House Digital, 2009.