Read the excerpt from I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. How does the allusion to William Shakespeare affect the meaning of the text? It shows that Angelou identifies with the feelings expressed in Shakespeare's poem. During these years in Stamps, I met and fell in love with William Shakespeare. He was my first white love. Although I enjoyed and respected Kipling, Poe, Butler, Thackeray and Henley, 1 saved my young and loyal passion for Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Langston Hughes, James Weldon Johnson and W. E.B. Du Bois' "Litany at Atlanta." But it was Shakespeare who said, "When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes." It was a state with which I felt myself most familiar. O It reveals how much Angelou admires those who are not like herself. O It suggests Angelou's desire to leave her surroundings and go elsewhere. O It foreshadows Angelou's future career as a writer.