![]() Although he first praised Wright’s novel, and celebrated the righteous indignation of the work as an “ immense liberation and revelation,” his later concern with Bigger’s portrayal led him to excoriate his mentor in the 1949 essay “Everybody’s Protest Novel.” In the critique, which later sprouted into the strategically named essay collection Notes of a Native Son, Baldwin admonishes his literary forefather for what he described as Native Son’s grating, dimensionless depiction of black life in America. ![]() ![]() The book garnered comparisons to John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath and earned Wright the title of America’s “best Negro writer.”īut James Baldwin, Wright’s then-25-year-old protegé, was not so generous in his estimation of Native Son. The story of Bigger Thomas-a hardened, murderous black 20-year-old confronting poverty in Depression-era Chicago-thrust audiences into a complicated conversation about race and racism in America. Selling more than 215,000 copies in the three weeks following its American debut, Richard Wright’s 1940 novel, Native Son, successfully captivated readers nationwide. This article contains spoilers for Native Son. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |