Black Boy (American Hunger) (1945)

Years ago, I read an excerpt of this book for a college class, and ever since, it was on my list of “books to read someday.”  My to-buy book list on Amazon is long enough that I never prioritized it there, but not long ago, I happened upon a copy at my local used book store and snatched it up.

A memoir by novelist Richard Wright, Black Boy (American Hunger) chronicles his hard growing-up years in early-20^th-century Mississippi and his eventual escape to Chicago, where the promised American dream of the North isn’t as freely available as he’d hoped.  From the gnawing poverty to the soul-crushing racism, from the self-nurtured hunger for literature to the explorations of new political ideas, the book describes a tense journey of self, society, and what manhood means to a person who’s had the rites of manhood denied him based on the color of his skin.

This is an excellent book, and I’m glad the copy I found was recent enough that it included both sections of the story.  When it was originally published, the memoir only included Wright’s years in the South, ending with his departure to Chicago.  Part 2, his experiences in the North, weren’t published in their entirety until after Wright’s death more than 30 years later, and the whole work wasn’t released together in one volume until 1991.  I think it’s important to have both.  Many people, like Richard, probably have a general sense that his struggles with racism and marginalization are largely over when he leaves the South, but that isn’t the case.  Although it’s comforting in the North, to think of past chronic racism as a “Southern issue,” the North had (and continues to have) its own problems surrounding race, and Wright’s migration doesn’t equal deliverance.  Certainly, it’s of a different tenor and type, but it’s there all the same.

There’s so much to explore within this book.  The taut beauty of the prose, the child/teen focal point, and the Jim-Crow-era setting makes me think of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, although it is very much its own work.  Just the fact that Richard is a boy makes his experiences very different.  His temper and impulsive reactions get him labeled as trouble-making, volatile, even dangerous, from a very young age, and his teenage years are haunted by a constant threat of violence from those who think he doesn’t know his place.  He’s punished, prayed for, and passed from relative to relative, and he cycles through job after job – going in and out of school as his family’s ability allows – struggling to earn enough to keep his biting hunger at bay while acquiring a reputation for having a temperament unsuited for working for white people.  He survives because he refuses to starve.  He tries to kick down every wall he comes across.  And he pulls cons to get books, because the written word gives his soul more nourishment than anything he’s ever encountered.  He believes he can use his education to get himself out, yes, but it’s more than that.  It makes his world larger and his mind stretch further, and it sustains him in an environment where everything seems harsh and hateful.  Is it any wonder that he tries to pass that love down in such an exquisitely-written book?

Warnings

Strong thematic elements, language (including racial slurs,) violence, sexual content, and drinking/smoking.