'Black Boy' is an auto biography written by Richard Wright. His book was an account of his experiences as a youth during the early 1900s. Growing up in a segragated community, raised in a strict and abusive family, Richard learns to embrace himself for who he is without needing acceptance or approval from a judgemental and prideful society. Racism and isolation was a constant part of his life, and only through his desire to find meaning in all the suffering that he was able to fulfill a dream that no one could grasp away.
What made Richard unique in a broken society was that his independence, perseverence, and his rebellousness was what built his character. Through these traits, Richard Wright became capable of shaping his life regardless of the cirsumstances he was forced to confront. Richard had a difficult childhood and he did not have an easy way of understanding the kind of life he was braught in to. As a young boy, his curiosity made him ask so many questions that his mother was also eagerly trying to dismiss them.
Being avoided and only left with questions and wonder, Richard had to find answers to reality for himself. Eventually, Richard would become self- reliant and his experiences would bring him deeper to the truths of life. Having to mature so swiftly, he had to leave behind his constant curiousity and instead shape his mentality in a way that he can survive without a necesity of support from others. 'my father was a black peasant who had gone to the city seeking life, but who had failed in the city' (33).
Richard's parents could not always provide for him and had to become efficient on bringing about his own opportunities without having to rely on others. 'Though I was a child, I could no longer feel as a child, could no longer react as a child... When the neighbor's offered me food, I refused, already ashamed that so often in my life I had to be fed by strangers' (97) Early in his life, Richard had to face life changing situations and his hope of survival was to become independent. His mother was disabled and so he worked to provide for himself without having guidance or aproval.
Richard was confident and believed in himself to do anything and so he set aside people's oppinions to work on what he thought was justifiable. Living in segragation, Richard was in a postition where his worth and value were judged by others based on his appearence. Blacks were considered the bottom class and whites the highest. What drove Richard to become apart from the broken society was his willingness to live life the way he deemed to be correct. 'Because I had no power to make things happen outside of me in the objective world, I made things happen within.
Because my environment was bare and bleak, I endowed it with unlimited potentialities, redeemed it for my own hungry and cloudy yearning' (83). Richard was limited to the suffering and struggles of his environment. His understanding of the world fueled his desire and knowledge that there is another way to live life than the kind that he was given. ' And if that miracle ever happened, then I would know that there was hope in that southern swamp of despair and violence, that light could emerge even out of the blackest of the southern night'. 284) Although slavery is but long gone, there will always be racism and oppression. Richard barely had any relationships with other people of the black community and so lacked the willingness to help him or support Richard to become a writer because of the belief that he will remain as one of the social standards. Instead, Richard paved his own path towards success by having hope as his defence against conformity to oppression. His work ethic and ambitious goals was the formula to igniting the light of his dream.
Author: Erica Morris