As you finish this text, think particularly about how Richard reveals shifts in his thinking and feeling over the course of the text. You might want to describe the evolution of Richard’s attitude toward white people. At what points do we detect a shift in his attitude? Likewise, you might want to identify passages in the text where Richard reflects upon the very act of "reading" his own past. Does Richard critique his ability to understand his experiences of the past at any points in the text? In what ways does Wright, as an adult writing his autobiography in retrospect, color the description of events and experiences as they unfold?
As we finish the text, we will also cycle back to the original organizing metaphors the Wright sets up at the start of his autobiography? What role does hunger play in the autobiography? How does Richard view hunger at the end of the novel? Has his attitude changed?
I'm also interested in personal responses to the text. How has this text altered your perception of race in America? Of what it means--and how it feels--to grow up as a "black boy" during Jim Crow segregation?
I suggest you all read through the end material included in the edition I chose--there's some additional information about Richard Wright's life and the reception of this text that might be of interest.
By reading this book, I have had a closer look at one particular experience of living under the laws of Jim Crow segregation. There has always been some idea in my mind about the unfairness of segregation and slavery, but this has been my first account with reading first hand of some of the events that took place on a regular basis. You can see in the text how after Richard moves to Chicago and while race is more tolerated there than in the southern states where he grew up, he struggles with opening up and trusting himself to new relationships. He is never really sure of himself when he speaks to anyone white or black. He is constantly afraid of the reactions from others when they see him reading and writing and having opinions of his own. He cannot understand why some of people of his same culture and background find it funny and disturbing as to why he wants to read and write so much. This fear that he has, was cultivated in him since he was a young boy and is obviously carried with him throughout his entire life. I have not yet reached the end of the book, so have yet to see if Richard overcomes this fear just a little and starts to let people into his world.
ReplyDeleteThis book had been an informative and humbling experience. Reading real experiences from the Jim- Crow segregation era makes me feel extremely lucky and grateful to live in this day and age. There are still many problems with today's culture but not as numerous and accepted as were these travesties.
ReplyDeleteWatching the journey that Richard had to go through from being a rambunctious, fearless boy into a conscious and intelligent man is an enlightening one.
He undergoes many problems and describes in such realistic ways that the reader cannot help but be somewhat traumatized themselves by trying to understand what Richard must have heard, seen, and felt during his continuous struggle.
One of the most interesting patterns I saw throughout the book was that between Richard’s social restrictions and his mental state. When he was a child he had the most social restrictions enforced on him socially and by his family but his personality allows him to be mentally free of self-consciousness and stereotypes as he got older and become less restricted in his actions he turned further inward. The more he got to know society the less he gladly interacted with it. The more bold his choices were socially the more introverted he became. As he became more aware of his culture the more he resented it yet he could never shake some sort of humble appreciation for it that sculpted many of his actions and reactions for the rest of his life.
Irony has been a huge part of this text. Both whites and blacks, as depicted by Wright, have displayed actions, said comments, or acted in a way that was ironic towards their situations. Wright comments about how blacks are "designed" to hate Jews but joins a sort of "cult" with an Irish boy and a Jew and they talk about life as if nothing separated them. When Wright moved to the North, I feel that a shift occured in him. His attitude towards life, towards America, and towards the race issue changed. He found that in the North he was more able to speak his mind and not be ashamed by his thoughts. In the South he was bound to a strick moral and unethical code that he could not overcome. In the North he became more aware of his surroundings and his current state of life. Instead of falling on his knees in the face of segregation, in the North he stood up and faced his fears.
ReplyDeleteThis text was very different from any other text I've read pertaining to the issue of race. It was raw, real and emotional. I really enjoyed it.
At the beginning of this section of the book, we see Richard have an epiphany in Chapter 17. He realizes that he is not isolated from the black community. They all feel "hunger" individually but, at the same time, together. This relates to Richard’s interview with Ross, when both men “were hungry” and depending on the public or society for survival. Also, this seems like the first time we see Richard have anything remotely close to a friendship as an adult.
ReplyDeleteThere are two instances when I feel especially sympathetic toward Richard, or the Jim Crow Negroes in general. One that stands out to me is the description of Richard’s job at the medical research institute, slitting the vocal cords of the dogs. The image of dogs silently howling was vividly painted. This mirrors the feelings of powerlessness, as well as the inability to vocally express feelings, within black people at the time of Jim Crow. When Richard goes to the convention, I feel sorry for him because he realizes that he truly has no say in what goes on in the Communist Party. Upon reflection, I think it is interesting that in both of these cases, someone is seen struggling but not heard.
In this text we see the evolution of the White Giant of Richard’s unconscious, and by extension of the unconscious of all blacks. In his youth the whites were “invisible,” and racial stigma was something he had to be “baptized” into. Now he understands the game, has been a party to countless moments of racial tension. As he begins to contemplate psychology and literature, as his mind turns in and his pen turns out, he insulates himself, and balks against the auto-oppression so many of his acquaintances have internalized.
ReplyDeleteRichard’s feelings about hunger also see a great shift over the course of the text. When he is a child, hunger is paralyzing, or else an impetus for desperate measures. But as an adult in the relief center, Richard experiences the unifying quality of hunger. Rather than looking upon this humbled group as a typically ineffectual unit of the black population, he recognizes that by their very lack of ambition they are revolutionary; they are, if unwittingly, testing the hegemony of the Dream over which whites have always had a monopoly.
Finally, Richard’s intellectualism culminates in communism, the ultimate theoretically-utopian social order. But Wright does not end the narrative here. The final scene is a disillusioning one for Richard, as a brief incident with a party member leads him to the conclusion that these people, like everyone else, are in for “a long and bloody time, a lot of stumbling and a lot of falling, before they find the right road” (382).
Each of these evolutions is sympathetic, if not empathetic, due to Wright’s masterful writing. This novel, for me, seems to encourage an intellectual engagement of all aspects of identification. But one should take care that their skepticism does not turn to cynicism, which achieves nothing.
The end of Wrights "Black Boy" gave me the chills as I did not see this novel ending the way that it did. In a sense, it ended with no absolution. It was depressing yet it was intimidatingly empowering as well. I'm having a hard time explaining my feelings towards this novel and towards Wright as a person. I always liked him throughout the novel, and as he evolved, readers witnessed him becoming a different type of man than a child. The thing is, is he doesn't try to present himself as a consistently moral human being. He admits to his faults, admits to the things he does that he knew would be looked down upon, like the insurance company schemes. I end up with more respect for him because of the way that he can admit to these things and take credit for them. He is humbling towards himself.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to the hunger theme of this book, I can conclude it with a direct quote from the book. "All my life I had been full of a hunger for a new way to live..." (pg 383) That says it all. Hunger served as a huge metaphor for the whole novel as we already knew. The metaphor changed though as the book went on. I agree with what ''nmadey''wrote on the theme of hunger in this book. It began as a metaphor for desperate measures, and over time it developed into a metaphor as a unifying quality between men and groups. The idea of hunger in this novel has probably been the most interesting part for me to contemplate on as I've read.
In a sense, it is painful to read this novel because of the disheartening way Wrights own people treat him throughout his childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. He takes a different approach by shunning his own peoples actions and while I respect him for his independence, it also makes me contemplate if his hostile relationship with most people in his life stemmed from how he was raised. Did his strong will derive from his adolescence? Perhaps he raised himself to be fiercely independent and strong-willed as he often had no one to rely on in his childhood.
I respect Wright's character and I respect this book. This has been the mot engaging one we have read thus far I believe.
The hate within the Communist party is a paradox. This group of people who is trying so desperately to abolish racial injustice and unite people of every color still has not overcome hate within its own group. Wright describes this as an eye opening moment for him. Here he realizes that when one form of hate is finally overcome, another kind of hate is always to follow. He has tried all his life to escape these feelings of hate, and to escape a life where he must always walk on egg shells. Wright seems to have traded one kind of oppressing lifestyle for another. In the Communist party no one judges him because of the color of his skin, yet he is still unable to speak his mind. No one understands his motives and feelings, and he is consequently places on the outside of the Communist party. Reflecting on his nativity later, he sees that upon first joining the group the only looked at the surface of Communism, not understanding their secret motives. He could now see that the Communists were more involved in their party and expanding the party rather than really taking action and promoting free thinking.
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