(outside of Natchez) on a plantation where his illiterate father was a sharecropper. Wright was raised by his relatives at by the age of 17, he was ready to get out into the world. He headed into Memphis, Tennessee (his relatives lived right outside the city) where he worked odd jobs and educated himself. He read array of novels as he grew up and his education helped him realize the unjust ways of segregation.

In 1927, Wright moved to Chicago after the peak of the Harlem Renaissance (a pivotal time for African Americans to express themselves through music, writings, and art). In Chicago, he worked as a postal worker, but was laid off with the depression. Wright then joined the Federal Writers Project, a state sponsored guild for authors, in which Wright composed his first novel, Uncle Tom’s Children. During this time, Wright joined the Communist party, which was often carried out into his writings. By 1939, Wright had moved to New York City and kept ties with the party for only a few more years. He married in 1941, and had left the communist party by 1944.

During World War II, Wright lectured around New York. With the end of the War, Wright moved

7. Richard Wright uses many forms of figurative language in the novel Native Son,

the African Americans and Wright hoped that a leader for a civil rights movement would come forward. The central themes of the novel include racial injustice and social immorality. As the African Americans are kept on the ‘black belt’, or forced to live in South-side Chicago, we are slowly introduced to the methods the white businessman uses to keep African American suppressed. Patronizing is a trait often innate in the white man, for example, although Mr. Dalton will not rent to African Americans in certain areas of Chicago, he feels guilty so he gives the African American youth community trivial items such as Ping-Pong tables.

This quote sums up the life Bigger has lead; Bigger is “malnutrition”, starving from being pented up and forced to live a certain way in certain places. He is frustrated and angry and at the world and like a ticking bomb, he exploded. Wright does an excellent job with this quote because everyone can relate to it: As long as you are an American, your central ideals are based on that fact that you, as a citizen, are free. Yet Bigger can not get a job, is only educated to the eighth grade level, and is taught from the beginning that he is to be considered a “lower” class. Wright points out that somewhere we had forgotten that we are all human, and we all have the same intentions and desires, yet we are running around treating the African Americans as if they are replaceable and do not take them into consideration. However, a problem can not be ignored, just as a human can not be ignored; it will only be so long before people will realize what they are capable of and they will ei!

The dialogue of the book represented local color. Those who were considered lower and ignorant spoke: “Ah don’ care! Ah’d die firs’ (Wright 252)!” However, the thoughts of Bigger were precise and let one realize the depth of his thoughts and his new understands of life: “They don’t even let you feel what you want to feel. They after you so hot and hard you can only feel what they doing to you. They kill you before you die (Wright 353)” and “I wanted to be happy in this world, not out of it. I didn’t want that kind of happiness. The white folks like for us to be religious, then they can do what they want to with us (Wright 356).”

Buddy Thomas - is Bigger’s younger brother. Buddy tends to sit back in the shadows and vision what life could be like without doing much. He envious of Bigger’s job yet is willing to “kill” all the people who hurt Bigger. He tends to have a conformist sense about him because he spends most of his time agreeing with what Bigger says and simply trying to protect him, like when Bigger dropped a large sum of money and Buddy did not tell.

Mary Dalton - Mary Dalton is the infamous daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Dalton, known for her love affairs with Communist and wild spirit. Bigger first meets Mary when interviewing with Mr. Dalton for his job. Mary automatically begins speaking to him like no white woman has even spoken to him before, asking him about unions and such matters. Bigger automatically does like her, for he is frightened by her straightforward nature. After being hired, Bigger’s first job as a chaffer is to take Mary to the University, however, Mary had other plans in mind. She takes Bigger out with Jan to eat in the South Side and discuss Communist ideals with him. Bigger does not understand why she speaks to him the same she speaks to Jan and is willing to sit next to him in a car and such. Later that night as he is putting Mary to bed, for she is to drunk to even walk into the house, he becomes terrified upon hearing Mrs. Dalton. He knows that to be found alone with a white girl in her bedroom would b!

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