Native son
Native son...what does the nov1) Which book expresses best, Richard Wright's powerful delineation of the black American experience? It is my opinion that book three: is the best expression of the black experience in America. On page 276 half way through the first paragraph in the thoughts of Bigger Thomas is this first illustrated. Bigger is thinking the following: "that they regarded him as a figment of that black world which they feared and were anxious to keep under control. The atmosphere of the crowd told him that they were going to use his death as a bloody symbol of fear to wave before the eyes of that black world".
It is common knowledge that people fear what they don't know but what is not common knowledge is how those fears are manifested. In this part of the novel we see fully how fear can turn into murder and rape. Not just murder and rape in the physical sense, but in the emotional and mental sense as well. Not only is Bigger Thomas and the life that he lived an example but the very language that is used by the people around him.
They are living in fear of what they have created and contribute to everyday. The mere fact that they do not see a problem is evidencing enough of this fear. As bigger thinks, they are fearful of losing control. I cannot help but think about a zookeeper putting himself in danger to imprison an animal of the wild. It is basically the same thing. The zookeeper has captured some wild animal and tried to tame it but in the back of his mind he knows that he cannot. The whites in this time, in this novel, have tried to keep the blacks in a certain area and maintain control over that area, but they realize through Bigger that they are losing that control and will use his death as a model of what could happen.
The second passage that illustrates these points is page 408, the first full paragraph. In Buckley's argument you can hear the fear but most of all you hear those words of control. The words that he uses are not just meant for the judge but the world outside the courtroom. He says "My voice may sound vindictive�but I am really saying is that the law is sweet when it is enforced and protects a million worthy careers�from the ravishing of men who know no law." Is it the fact that these men he is speaking of know no law because the laws they have to live by are the very laws that are designed to keep them oppressed? The million careers...
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