Native Son Essay Research Paper A Critical

Native Son Essay, Research Paper

A Critical Perspective: Richard Wright’s Native Son

Richard Wright marked the beginning of a new era in black fiction. He was one of

the first American writers of his time to confront his readers with the effects of racism.

Wright had a way of telling his reader about his own life through his writing. He is best

known for his novel, Native Son, which is deeply rooted in his personal life and the times

in which he lived. This paper will discuss this outstanding American writer, his highly

acclaimed novel, Native Son, and how his life influenced his writing.

Richard Nathaniel Wright, was born on September 4, 1908 in Roxie, Mississippi.

His father was a sharecropper and his mother a schoolteacher. In search for better

employment his father moved the family to Memphis, Tennessee. While in Memphis, his

father worked as a night porter in a hotel and his mother worked as a cook for a

Caucasian family. Shortly after their move to Memphis, Wright’s father deserted his

family. His mother then tried to find any work she could find to support her family. Then,

at the age of seven his mother became ill and was unable to financially support her family.

As a result, the family had to move to Jackson, Mississippi to live with relatives. Wright

remained in Jackson until 1925 (Walker, 13).

In 1925, Wright left Jackson and headed as far as his money could take him, and

that was Memphis, Tennessee. Memphis was the exact same city in which his father had

taken his family to find a better life and where he abandoned them. Wright’s first trip to

Memphis ended in disappointment, desertion, and deprivation. While there Wright found

work as a messenger for an optical company. He lived in Memphis for approximately

two years. During that time, he witnessed the deep and violent South which eventually

would permanently scar him for life. Margaret Walker wrote:

I am convinced that the best of Richard Wright’s fiction grew out of the

first nineteen years of his life. All he ever wrote of great strength and

terrifying beauty must be understood in this light. His subjects and themes,

his folk references and history, his characters and places come from the

South of his childhood and adolescence. His morbid interest in

violence-lynching, rape, and murder-goes back to the murky twilight of a

southern past. Out of this racial nightmare marked with racial suffering,

poverty, religious fanaticism and sexual confusion emerge the five long

stories in Uncle Tom’s Children. (Walker 43)

The violent impression of Southern racism marked Wright’s personality and literature. As

a result, he would spend his entire life struggling to express the importance for men to

reject the stereotypic notions of race, class, creed, or any other prejudice and to accept

human value that honor the human spirit and release intelligence. It was Wright’s first

nineteen years in the South that opened up his most powerful and passionate writing

(Walker 43).

In 1927, at the age of nineteen Wright migrated to Chicago, Illinois. In Chicago,

Wright found a job a as Post Office Clerk and at the same time he continued to

self-educate himself by reading books, magazines, and newspapers. While in Chicago he

became interested in Communism Issues. The interest came as a result of his concern with

the social roots of racial oppression. In 1932, Wright joined the Communist party. He

was a party activist in Chicago and New York. Wright’s involvement with the Communist

party became the subject of most of his fiction writings. After he broke away from the

party his writings were centered around it. Wright’s years in Chicago are often considered

his maturation years, which were years of growing maturity and preparing for an

illustrious future (Metzger 608).

Wright’s career as a writer basically began in the 1930’s. In 1930, he wrote his

first novel, Lawd Today. His novel, Lawd Today, however was not published until after

his death. His first published work was, Uncle Tom’s Children: Five Long Stories, which

consists of stories that attack the racial discrimination and bigotry that Wright encountered

as a youth. Throughout Wright’s career he published many outstanding works. Among

his works included: five novels, two autobiographies, two books of short stories, four

nonfiction books and one collection of essays. Wright’s major influence began when he

published, Native Son , in 1940.

Richard Wright’s most notable and highly acclaimed novel is Native Son.

Richard Wright contemplated for a while before he decided to write a novel in which a

Negro, Bigger Thomas, would become a symbolic figure of American life. The novel is

divided into sections entitled: fear, flight, and fate. Each section is used as a way to chart

the changes in the main character’s, Bigger Thomas, mind. Native Son, is the story of,

Bigger Thomas, a poor young black man who

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