Question

In “Letter from Birmingham Jail” Martin Luther King, Jr. writes: “... but we still creep at horse and buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter.” In at least 150 words, identify and explain the metaphors in this quotation and discuss how these figures of speech add to King’s arguments in the letter.

Answer 1

The quotation is used as a comparison to how much they, African Americans, still struggle to get simple things such as getting a cup of coffee at a lunch counter or getting a newspaper at a local news stand , as if they were in a time before automobiles and buses , back when African Americans were enslaved and treated unfairly . It's using the metaphor as a way to show how little they've progressed through out the decades.