Exigence and Audience

Amanda Gorman’s inaugural poem “The Hill We Climb” was delivered at a difficult point in America’s history, to a perhaps unprecedented audience. Directly before Biden’s presidential inauguration on January 20th, 2021, the country was in turmoil. The January 6th Capitol riots had left the country’s leaders shaken, the Black Lives Matter movement, kicked off by the murder of George Floyd, had also become a point of contention, and the COVID-19 pandemic was still in full swing. People Magazine journalist Alexandra Rockey Fleming spoke firsthand on the tense conditions leading up to her arrival at the Capitol building to cover the inauguration, stating that “the streets swelled with thousands of patrolling National Guardsmen,” and “officials had issued a warning [..] any member of the press who arrived to the inauguration on Wednesday wearing a bulletproof vest, gas mask or helmet would be denied entry” (Fleming). The large National Guard presence and almost dystopian-sounding warnings show the fear even those organizing the inauguration felt after the Capitol had been attacked just two weeks prior. The usual cheering crowds around the National Mall were absent, and the physical audience consisted of several US former presidents (though not the previous one), senators, congressmen, and Supreme Court Justices, as well as several of Biden’s foremost rivals for the democratic candidacy, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Combined with a few lucky journalists and members of the media, and the family of the president-to-be, fully masked up and sitting on folding chairs a safe distance from each other, the audience Amanda Gorman looked out upon might not have been what she was expecting when she was selected to be the inaugural poet. This included several former presidents, though not Donald Trump, some Supreme Court Justices, senators, and congressmen, as well as a few of Biden’s rivals for the Democratic candidacy, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. But this disregards the most crucial audience- the American public. Her speech was live and broadcast to a people disillusioned by a raging pandemic and a growing feeling of discontent with the government. Many, because of the former president’s seeming refusal of a transfer of power, were unsure that the inauguration would even proceed as planned. Her speech had the difficult task of uniting a divided people, from the elite present at the event to the American citizens watching the inauguration now and in the future. As she touched on America’s difficult path to the present, specifically with the treatment of Black Americans, as well as our enduring hope for the future, it was easy to understand how her speech could resonate throughout the country, and history.