Outline for “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks

Outline for “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks 

Thesis: The speaker in Gwendolyn Brooks’s poem “We Real Cool” feels that the “cool” people in the poem are actually simplistic, immature, and naive, and shows it by using a mocking tone, a simplistic rhythm, and a structure that emphasizes their poor actions and decisions. 

• Italics — The italics at the beginning of the poem set the setting and let the reader know who the “we” is that is mentioned continuously throughout the poem and what the group is doing, informing the reader that the “cool” people are a group of pool players at a club or bar. 
• Use of “We” and Sarcastic Tone — Although the speaker associates him or herself with the “cool” people by using “we,” he or she distances him or herself by using a sarcastic tone, which implies that the speaker is actually mocking this group of people, emphasized by the last line that states “We / Die soon” (7-8). Although the group thinks their actions are cool, the speaker recognizes that they are childish and will not end well. 
• Caesura Pauses — The poem is structured by putting the subject of a sentence on one line and then action on the next line, immediately followed by the subject of the next sentence. For example, the first couplet says, “We real cool. We / Left school. / We” (1-2). This structure is created with Caesura pauses, which break up each line and put emphasis on the actions of the “cool” people and the poor choices they have made. The structure becomes very effective in the last line, which only says “Die soon” (8), and indicates that their actions will lead to a short life and a tragic end. 
• Rhyme Pattern — As the speaker stated, “We / Left school” (1-2). The speaker looks down on this choice especially and thinks that these people are unintelligent and naive because of the decision. Each couplet features a pair of simplistic rhymes within each line. For example, “late” (3) is paired with “straight” (4) and “sin” (5) with “gin” (6). The simplistic rhymes the speaker uses emphasize the childish and unsophisticated nature of the “cool” people because these are the sorts of rhymes that an elementary schooler would create and use.