Black Boy by Richard Wright - Denise Billings's review
A gripping story that says a lot with an economy words. By page 16 so much had happened to four year old Richard, I could barely sleep thinking about what I'd just read. The story begins in about 1909 in Jackson, Mississippi and goes until 1926 when young Richard finally escapes the South where is brilliant and hungry mind just would not allow him to remain. If he stayed there he would have died or certainly would have been killed.
His family and friends could not understand why he wanted to read and they definitely could not wrap their minds around him wanting to be a writer. He might as well have told them he wanted to walk on the moon. When he mentioned reading to his friends they constantly asked him why. Why did he want to read those books? Why did he want to read when he didn't have to?
"I was building up in me a dream which the entire educational system of the South had been rigged to stifle. I was feeling the very thing that the state of Mississippi had spent millions of dollars to make sure that I would never feel; I was becoming aware of the thing that the Jim Crow laws had been drafted and passed to keep out of my consciousness; I was acting on impulses that southern senators in the nation's capital had striven to keep out of Negro life; I was beginning to dream the dreams that the state had said were wrong, that the schools had said were taboo."
This was true in 1924 and apparently is still true today.
When Richard's friend's brother was killed he thought "Bob had been caught by the white death, the threat of which hung over every black male in the south." What he heard "altered the look of the world, induced in me a temporary paralysis of will and impulse. The penalty of death awaited me if I made a false move and I wondered if it was worth-while to make any move at all."
Fortunately he had the wherewithal to push past this hopeless feeling. He was a conscious boy living in a world where that attitude would get him killed. The kids today would say he's "woke". He resisted and no one understood why he resisted. Everyone in the black community was simply trying to stay alive. Going along with the Jim Crow ways was the easiest way to do so.
"I had begun coping with the white world too late. I could not make subservience an automatic part of my behavior. I had to feel and think out each tiny item of racial experience in the light of the whole race problem, and to each item I brought the whole of my life. While standing before a white man I had to figure out how to perform each act and how to say each word. I could not help it. I could not grin. In the past I had always said too much, now I found that it was difficult to say anything at all. I could not react as the world in which I lived expected me to; that world was too baffling, too uncertain."
He had been relatively sheltered from white people during his childhood. He had people in his family who looked like white people. He didn't grow up seeing colors. But now, if he did or said the wrong thing, and he never could be sure of the right thing, he could very easily die.
He finally saved enough money to move from Jackson Mississippi to Memphis Tennessee. There he was still trying to read as much as possible. Still people around him, blacks and especially whites couldn't understand why he wanted to read and discouraged him at every turn. He had a job running errands for a white man. Sometimes he was sent with a note to the library. Blacks were not allowed in the libraries at that time. He found a way to get books by forging notes from his boss, with the boss's permission. This particular white man was a Catholic who was shunned by the other southern white men. He went back to the library again and again. The more he read the more he wanted to read.
I related to how he said the books were like a drug to him, like dope. The books helped him understand the narrow lives of the white men who had so much power over him. Books kept his hope alive. Showed him other ways of life. To me that is the beauty of books. The beauty of this book is that it showed the world what life was like in the bad old days. It showed that things have changed but we still have a long way to go.
His family and friends could not understand why he wanted to read and they definitely could not wrap their minds around him wanting to be a writer. He might as well have told them he wanted to walk on the moon. When he mentioned reading to his friends they constantly asked him why. Why did he want to read those books? Why did he want to read when he didn't have to?
"I was building up in me a dream which the entire educational system of the South had been rigged to stifle. I was feeling the very thing that the state of Mississippi had spent millions of dollars to make sure that I would never feel; I was becoming aware of the thing that the Jim Crow laws had been drafted and passed to keep out of my consciousness; I was acting on impulses that southern senators in the nation's capital had striven to keep out of Negro life; I was beginning to dream the dreams that the state had said were wrong, that the schools had said were taboo."
This was true in 1924 and apparently is still true today.
When Richard's friend's brother was killed he thought "Bob had been caught by the white death, the threat of which hung over every black male in the south." What he heard "altered the look of the world, induced in me a temporary paralysis of will and impulse. The penalty of death awaited me if I made a false move and I wondered if it was worth-while to make any move at all."
Fortunately he had the wherewithal to push past this hopeless feeling. He was a conscious boy living in a world where that attitude would get him killed. The kids today would say he's "woke". He resisted and no one understood why he resisted. Everyone in the black community was simply trying to stay alive. Going along with the Jim Crow ways was the easiest way to do so.
"I had begun coping with the white world too late. I could not make subservience an automatic part of my behavior. I had to feel and think out each tiny item of racial experience in the light of the whole race problem, and to each item I brought the whole of my life. While standing before a white man I had to figure out how to perform each act and how to say each word. I could not help it. I could not grin. In the past I had always said too much, now I found that it was difficult to say anything at all. I could not react as the world in which I lived expected me to; that world was too baffling, too uncertain."
He had been relatively sheltered from white people during his childhood. He had people in his family who looked like white people. He didn't grow up seeing colors. But now, if he did or said the wrong thing, and he never could be sure of the right thing, he could very easily die.
He finally saved enough money to move from Jackson Mississippi to Memphis Tennessee. There he was still trying to read as much as possible. Still people around him, blacks and especially whites couldn't understand why he wanted to read and discouraged him at every turn. He had a job running errands for a white man. Sometimes he was sent with a note to the library. Blacks were not allowed in the libraries at that time. He found a way to get books by forging notes from his boss, with the boss's permission. This particular white man was a Catholic who was shunned by the other southern white men. He went back to the library again and again. The more he read the more he wanted to read.
I related to how he said the books were like a drug to him, like dope. The books helped him understand the narrow lives of the white men who had so much power over him. Books kept his hope alive. Showed him other ways of life. To me that is the beauty of books. The beauty of this book is that it showed the world what life was like in the bad old days. It showed that things have changed but we still have a long way to go.
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What a good review, if the book is as well written and flows as easily as this, I just might read it!
ReplyDeleteShirley
It is!
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