The Prodigal Son

E942057

The Prodigal Son is a poetic sermon by James Weldon Johnson that retells the biblical parable of repentance and forgiveness in a rich, rhythmic African American vernacular style.

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Label Occurrences
The Prodigal Son canonical 1

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Statements (48)

Predicate Object
instanceOf literaryWork
poem
sermon
author James Weldon Johnson NERFINISHED
basedOn Gospel of Luke NERFINISHED
Parable of the Prodigal Son NERFINISHED
countryOfOrigin United States of America
surface form: United States
culturalContext African American church tradition
Black preaching tradition
depictsCharacter forgiving father
prodigal son
firstPublicationCollection God’s Trombones NERFINISHED
firstPublicationYear 1927
genre African American literature
religious poetry
sermonic poetry
hasInfluenceOn performance poetry
spoken word traditions
intendedAudience church congregation
intendedMedium oral performance
language English
literaryForm poetic sermon
literaryMovement Harlem Renaissance NERFINISHED
moralLesson God’s mercy toward repentant sinners
importance of returning to God
narrativePerspective preacher-narrator
partOf James Weldon Johnson’s religious verse
publisherOfFirstCollection Viking Press NERFINISHED
religiousTradition Christianity
setting biblical world
sharesCollectionWith Go Down Death NERFINISHED
Let My People Go NERFINISHED
Listen, Lord
Noah Built the Ark NERFINISHED
The Creation NERFINISHED
The Crucifixion NERFINISHED
The Judgment Day NERFINISHED
style African American vernacular
rhythmic
theme fatherly love
forgiveness
repentance
return and reconciliation
sin and redemption
usesDevice biblical allusion
call and response
colloquial diction
repetition

How these facts were elicited

Referenced by (1)

Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.

God’s Trombones hasPart The Prodigal Son