The Artistic Endeavour of Richard Wright - Research Paper Example

The Artistic Endeavour of Richard Wright Introduction In September 4 the year 1908, a poet and a writer of African-American descent by the name, Richard Wright was born in Roxie, Mississippi. The theme of his writing was mainly on racism mostly the plight of the African-Americans during the 19th to 20th century. His passion for writing led him to publish his first book at the age of sixteen. His literature helped in changing of the race relations in his home country, the United States of America, in the mid 20th century. This essay is going to look into Richard’s life and sample some of his writings (Rowley 4). Biography Richard Nathaniel Wright, an African American poet and writer, was born in the year 1908 on the fourth day of the month of September to a sharecropper in Roxie, Mississippi. He was mostly raised by his mother, who became a single parent after Wright’s father left the family when his son was just five, and partly by his maternal grandmother and aunt. Wright schooled in Jackson where he lived with his grandmother. He managed to get to the ninth grade and graduated in 1923 from Robertson junior high school as a valedictorian.While living in Jackson, he developed a negative attitude towards religion because his grandmother and aunt had strict rules on religion. These rules were such that he could not even work on Sunday (Rowley 4). Wright tried to enroll in the Lanier high school but could not continue with schooling since he had to earn money to cater for family expenses. At the age of sixteen, he published his first story by the title The Voodoo of Hell’s Half-Acre at a local black newspaper after the impression of racism that was created in him during his childhood (Rowley 34). In 1927, he moved to Chicago where he was employed at the Post office as a clerk. There he spent his free time reading writings from other authors. He was then forced to join the communist party due to the Great Depression. He came into view as a revolutionary poet in 1933 and wrote several poems. He continued writing poems, stories, and novels having his first novel, Lawd Today, published in 1935(Rowley 191). He moved to Paris and got a French citizenship in 1947. He made friends with famous French authors and even wrote more when there with his first book in France, The Outsider, being published in 1953. Richard Nathaniel Wright died of a heart attack on 28 November 1960 while writing his book, A Father’s Law, which was later finished by his daughter (Rowley 344). Wright’s Writings Being gifted in with words plus unquenchable thirst for reading, Richard Wright emerged as one of the best and the most powerful African American writers of the 19th and 20th century. His writings, which were based on the theme of racism, have been termed as inspirational. Although his upbringing in Mississippi was for just a few years of his lifetime, it contributed alot to his choice theme (Rowley, 141). The Native Sonis one of Wrights most important works. This story is about a young black man by the name Bigger Thomas living in absolute poverty. Bigger lives with his brother, sister, and mother in a one-roomed house. He hates his family because the state they live in and there is nothing they can do about it. He looks for a job so than he can provide for his family and goes to see one Mr. Dalton, a white man, concerning the job. He gets the job he is looking for in the big luxurious house where his employers use words he cannot understand and staying there becomes very uncomfortable despite his employers struggle to be kind to him. His employer’s daughter by the name Mary questions him about not belonging to a union and calls her father a capitalist. Bigger ends up confused and even more confused when the cook tells him to avoid Mary’s communist friends (Native Son 2). Bigger’s first duty involved him driving Mary and she meets Jan, her communist boyfriend. The two oblige bigger for them to meet Jan’s friends for dinner. Jan and Mary make that night very frustrating to bigger as they talk to him and ask him to call them by their first names. They drink and have sex in the back seat as he drives in the park after dinner. Jan goes his way leaving Mary drunk such that Bigger has to carry her to her room and he kisses her despite his fear of being seen carrying her. Mrs. Dalton, Mary’s mum, enters the room and though she is blind, bigger is scared she might sense him. He tries to silence Mary by placing a pillow on her face and suffocates her in the process. Mrs. Dalton leaves the room after scolding her daughter and that is when Bigger realizes Mary is dead. He quickly thinks of what to do and decides to burn Mary’s body in the family furnace and tell everyone Jan is the one who took her to the room(Native Son 230). Investigations on Mary’s disappearances start. Bigger sticks to his story line that it is Jan who took Mary into the room, a story that is certified by Mr. Dalton due to his dislike for Jan and Jan doesn’t deny it either. He then writes a false kidnap note and slips it under the Dalton room. When they found the note, they bring the police to investigate the case. Journalist and police officers soon arrive and Bigger resist the temptation to leave. He is then ordered to remove ashes from the furnace and make a new fire. Out of extreme fear, he just pokes the ashes and smoke fills the room. One journalist takes the shovel and pushes him aside so that he can remove the ashes instead and he discovers the remains of Mary’s earrings and bones in there and bigger flees. After that, Bigger then runs to his current girlfriend, Bessie, who had suspected him before and tells her everything. They leave together but Bigger rapes her and kills her into an air-shaft. He is finally caught after a wild chase with the police. In prison, Bigger is visited by Jan who offers him help of a lawyer called Max who is a communist like him. As Bigger spends time with the lawyer, he begins to understand his relationship with his family and the world at large. At last, he is found guilty of murder and false witness and is sentenced to death (Native Son 302). Another important writing of Richard is the novel by the name The Outsider that was the first novel he wrote after moving to France. The central character of this novel is named Cross Damon. He represented a man in the 20th century who is on a mad search of freedom. He put across as an intellectual black person, a fruit of a culture that did not want him. Cross believes there is more to life. He goes ahead to search for a meaningful and happy life. He is first introduced as a drunkard who takes liquor to kill the pain, which is a product of his frustrated and urgent sense of life, and to forget his problems. His intolerable life is made up of a fifteen-year-old girlfriend, abused wife, and moralistic mother (The Outsider 4). Cross survives a sub-way accident and later learns that a mutilated body has been identified as him. He decides to use this opportunity to create himself afresh in the hope of finding happiness in life. A friend saw him and he decided to kill him rather than return to his meaningless life. He commits three more murders in his quest. He encounters communism, which he accepts is true but he is angered by the communists acceptance and exploitation of the facts. Due to this rage, he kills a communist who introduced him to communism.Having not accepted religion, cross puts his last hope for finding what he was seeking for in love. However, his mistress commits suicide when she sees the state he is in. The Law convicts him of a crime and condemns him. Cross is then murdered and says life was horrible just before he died, when he is asked how it was by the district attorney who took his case (The Outsider 298). Conclusion Richard Nathaniel Wright books were mainly advocating for equal treatment of all races especially the blacks who were rejected by the whites. This is evident in how the central characters in his books are mainly blacks who are bitter about their frustrating lives. His choice of writing can be traced to his upbringing by a struggling single mother who died leaving him an orphan. His struggle to make ends meet by working that ended up costing him his education, his father who abandoned his mother and him when he was just five years old, and his grandmother and aunt who thought the solution to their problems were in religion (Levy 2). His writing bore fruits in the late 20th century. His work contributed in changing race relations in the 20th century in the United States of America (Levy 128). Work Cited Levy, Debbie. Richard Wright: A Biography. Minneapolis, Minn: Twenty-First Century Books, 2008. Print. Rowley, Hazel. Richard Wright: The Life and Times. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008. Print. Wright, Richard. Native Son. New York: HarperCollins e-books, 2009.Internet resource. Wright, Richard. The Outsider.Pymble, NSW: HarperCollins e-books, 2009. Internet resource. Read More