What a great book, before I begin to post textual sources on the piece, I just wish to state my opinion on the subject.
American History carries with it many blemishes, which is okay- America never has been, is not, and never will be perfect. I am okay with that. However, one of it's most severe blemishes, is quickly turning into an incurable scar among it's face. Race Relations in America are something which continue to hinder it's ability to truly and completely be a fierce competitor within the world's educational/economic market. Honestly, how can America be the "world police" (as many reference it) if America can not fix it's own internal issues?
Since before the mighty year of 1776, when a courageous group of men held a Continental Congress and in it's second meeting decided to declare independence from a government's oppression. Colored people have been regarded as unequal.
Since before the infamous decade of the 1940s, when the world was in peril, and America fought an oppressor to the Jewish community. Colored people have been regarded as unequal.
(I love the irony of WWII, although many people think of America as a "heroine" during the war. This nation had been taking part in similar atrocities, as seen in Hitler Dominated Germany, before Hitler himself was even born!)
Still today, a day in which we have our first Colored President, I do not believe colored peoples are regarded as equal. The statistics of inmates, the many south, east, west side ghettos, the unemployment rates among minorities are all strong evidence to support my beliefs.
I strongly recommend the book _Race Matters_ by Cornel West- a MASTERPIECE.
West is great at not only calling Americana out on it's failures to "love" a people whom have been taught to hate themselves for way too long. West calls out his own ethnic group, the colored peoples as well.
So I went off on a tangent, it is okay. I like expressing my views.
On to Wright's _Native Son_.
Richard Wright was born 1908 (the year the NAACP started) in Roxie, Mississippi.
He was a part of arguably, or definitely, what is the best and most quintessential periods for African American Literature: the Harlem Renaissance. Wright took a strong role in changing the face of this type of art, morphing it into a form of literature which showed (with little ambiguity, as lit. before) the anger, frustration, and confusion of a people oppressed.
He received great acknowledgement for his novel, _Native Son_
Wrights does a superb job at demonstrating the way colored, and white, people saw the world during that time. Making sure he emphasizes the difference between "black asphalt" and "white clouds", black and white- and the differences between them- are an extended motif through out the novel.
In the eyes of Bigger, the main character, everything around him is either black or white, dark or light, good or evil. Which is what had to have been the same thought process of much of society living in the 1920's-'30s.
The quote which is the most important so far in the novel (I am half way done, maybe 1/3 the way there).
"Why did he and his folks have to live like this? What had they ever done? Perhaps they had not done anything. Maybe they had to live this way precisely because none of them in all their lives had ever done anything, right or wrong, that mattered much"- 1st book (p.105 in Perennial Classics Edition).
The narrator let's the reader inside Bigger's mind- his thoughts (which are sometimes far more crucial than actual dialogue). This quote, however, is not aimed at Bigger. Wright is directing it to the reader, like West in his book, he is also putting the blame of the issue on the colored people themselves. They had (at that time) never done anything "that mattered much", that was significant to change the way race relations were handled. Their voice was voiceless, their minds were mindless, and their power was powerless. & in a way, they added much to this lack of strength to raise up against the machine.
There are a myriad of quotes in the book which allude to Wright's ANGER, FRUSTRATION, AND CONFUSION.
Has anyone ever read the book? If so, I would like to read about your opinions of my thoughts, and of your own.
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