The Great Migration

Blacks had been leaving the South since the Emancipation Proclamation, but the numbers coming north increased dramatically over time. In 1910, blacks in America were overwhelmingly rural, with nine out of ten living in former Confederate states. From 1915 to 1930, one million blacks moved north. Richard Wright was part of this exodus from poverty and racism. By 1960, 75% of blacks in America lived in northern cities. This incredible alteration in the demographics of the United States had a profound effect on blacks as well as the political makeup of the nation as a whole. There are many reasons for this, the most important being the tremendous disappointment that met the individual migrants when they reached the North. The rapid infusion of people into the northern cities produced the ghettos described in Native Son. In addition, little effort was made to integrate the new arrivals with the rest of society. Instead, as Max argues with Mr. Dalton in Native Son, concerted efforts were made to keep them in the ghetto.

The Great Depression

The stock market crash of 1929 and the following years of high unemployment hit blacks even harder than whites. Nationwide, the unemployment rate jumped from 15% in 1929 to 25% in 1933. Between 25 and 40% of all blacks in major cities of the country were on public assistance. By 1934, 38% of blacks could not find wage earnings higher than the subsistence provided by public relief. As with Bigger Thomas, most blacks—if they could find employment—worked menial, low-paying jobs. In response to these conditions, artists and intellectuals took on radical politics and openly questioned American political institutions and values.

Political Freedom

Although the country had still not entered World War II, the United States Congress passed the Smith Act. This extended the prohibitions of the Espionage Act of 1917. The Smith Act made it a crime to advocate the overthrow of the government. Whether in publication or in membership of a political group—such as the Communist Party— it was illegal to challenge the legitimacy of the United States government. The act indicated an increased atmosphere of intolerance for alternative political ideas, which would eventually culminate in the McCarthy witch-hunts of the 1950s.

The setting of Native Son is an evocative portrayal of a city echoing the ambiance of 1930s Chicago, capturing the stark divide between the impoverished black neighborhoods and the affluent areas inhabited by the Daltons, whose wealth is insinuated to have been built at the expense of the black community. Richard Wright, through his narrative, delves into the challenges faced by black residents of South Side Chicago against the backdrop of the Great Depression, political corruption, and urban decay. This era of economic hardship and social turbulence is punctuated by a surge in interest towards radical political ideologies, embodied by characters like Jan Erlone and Boris Max.

A City of Contrasts

The city in Native Son mirrors Chicago's sprawling urban landscape, marked by a glaring dichotomy between the affluent and the destitute. The South Side, where the novel's protagonist, Bigger Thomas, resides, is depicted as a world of relentless poverty and racial segregation. This environment starkly contrasts with the world of the Daltons, whose luxury and security are underlined by their indirect exploitation of black labor and systemic racial oppression. Wright crafts this setting with a keen awareness of the socio-economic disparities that defined real-life Chicago during the 1930s. Through his depiction, Wright doesn't just create a backdrop but an intrinsic element of the narrative that amplifies the themes of inequality and racial injustice.

Historical and Sociological Influences

Richard Wright drew heavily from his own experiences living in South Side Chicago and borrowed from sociological research, particularly the studies by sociologist Louis Wirth, to create an authentic and compelling setting. Wirth's investigations into urban life and social organization provided Wright with insights into the systemic structures contributing to urban blight and racial segregation. Furthermore, Wright was influenced by the real-life trial of Robert Nixon, a black man convicted and executed for the murder of a white woman. The trial's sensational media coverage, often laced with racial bias, and the involvement of leftist groups such as the International Labor Defense, echoed in Wright’s depiction of racial tensions and the quest for justice in the novel.

The Impact of the Great Depression

Set during the throes of the Great Depression, Native Son captures the economic struggles that exacerbated racial and social tensions. The widespread unemployment and poverty added to the sense of desperation and unrest among the black community, factors that Wright meticulously weaves into the fabric of the novel. The Depression serves as a backdrop that accentuates the systemic barriers faced by the characters, particularly Bigger Thomas, whose life is a constant struggle against societal constraints and economic disenfranchisement. Wright uses these conditions not only to build his setting but to enhance the narrative's critique of capitalist structures and racial injustice.

Radical Political Landscape

The 1930s was a decade marked by political experimentation and the rise of radical ideas, particularly Marxism, which sought to address the inequalities perpetuated by capitalism. In Native Son, characters like Jan Erlone and Boris Max represent this ideological shift, advocating for social change and justice. Their presence in the novel highlights the clash between entrenched societal structures and emerging revolutionary ideologies. Wright integrates these elements into the setting, illustrating how political discourse of the time influenced individual lives and community dynamics. This infusion of political ideology into the setting not only enriches the narrative but also situates the personal struggles of the characters within a broader socio-political context.

Social Unrest and Media Influence

The social unrest of the era, coupled with biased media representation, plays a significant role in shaping the setting of Native Son. The trial of Robert Nixon serves as a direct inspiration for the novel, providing Wright with a real-world example of how media sensationalism and racial prejudice could sway public opinion and impact the judicial process. Through the character of Bigger Thomas, Wright explores the devastating effects of such societal biases, illustrating how they contribute to the cycle of marginalization and violence. The media's role in perpetuating stereotypes and inciting fear is a critical component of the setting, reflecting the pervasive racial tensions and the struggle for justice faced by black Americans during this time.

In synthesizing historical events, sociological research, and personal experiences, Richard Wright crafts a setting in Native Son that is as much a character as the individuals inhabiting it. The novel's depiction of 1930s Chicago is not merely a backdrop but an active participant in the unfolding drama, shaping and being shaped by the lives of its characters. Through his vivid portrayal of a city divided by race, class, and economic hardship, Wright offers a compelling exploration of the forces that drive human behavior and social change.

Point of View

An important technique employed in Native Son is a third-person limited narrative structure. This technique reveals all the action in the novel but limits it to the perspective of the central character. The narrative voice, then, takes on the vantage point of—but does not become—Bigger Thomas. Consequently, other characters appear flat because they are visible only through this limiting filter.

One advantage of this technique is that the reader becomes close to the protagonist. In other words, since the point of the novel is to reveal the mind of a dehumanized black man cornered in the ghetto, the reader must identify with Bigger. Wright wanted readers to understand how hostile the American environment is to those who have already been excluded based on skin color.

Setting

In Native Son, Wright suggests that environmental conditions play a role in Bigger’s psychodrama. Bigger sees the Dalton’s neighborhood as “a cold and distant world.” He learns that Mr. Dalton owns the South Side Real Estate Company, which in turn owns the decrepit house in which his family lives. During the trial, Max confronts Mr. Dalton, charging that the inadequate housing he rents to blacks contributes to their oppression.

A sense of claustrophobia pervades the work. Bigger’s family is crowded into a rat-infested room. His hangouts include the street, where he feels like a rat. At one point, Bigger admits to feeling “bottled up” in the city like a “wild animal.” He also feels that the “white world sprawled and towered” above him. The murder occurs when Bigger is trapped in Mary’s room. As Bigger flees the police manhunt, a record-breaking snowfall hits, blocking all roads in and out of Chicago and trapping Bigger in the city. The novel ends with Bigger alone in a small prison cell.

Symbolism

The drama of Bigger Thomas plays out in much the same way as the opening drama of the rat’s death. Both Bigger and the rat find themselves trapped, leaving them little choice but to fight for survival. The rat is closely associated with the decrepit environment that constitutes ghetto life. The novel consistently reveals the psychology of Bigger as being similar to the rat, caught in the confines of a “narrow circle, looking for a place to hide….” Conversely, the white cat at the Dalton house symbolizes the justice system of the whites. Bigger does not like this cat because of the attention it draws to him when it lands on his shoulder. When the cat will not easily go away, the reader senses Bigger’s eventual capture.

Bigger himself reflects on the degree to which those around him see the predicament of blacks and whites. Mrs. Dalton is blind, literally and metaphorically. She cannot see that her desire for Bigger to further his education is not what he wants from life. The rest of the family is blind to its own biases. The family’s claim of having liberal politics is undercut by Max’s charge that Mr. Dalton perpetuates the “black belt.” The name Dalton ironically recalls daltonism—color blindness.

In Native Son, Wright uses the same combination of direct, naturalistic prose and symbolism that he employed in Uncle Tom's Children. He carefully reconstructs the physical reality of South Side Chicago, using material gathered from sociological studies as well as his own experience. He then skillfully invests objects with symbolic significance, a technique that helps him overcome the linguistic limitations of his inarticulate protagonist.

But the most striking characteristic of Wright's method in Native Son is the stylistic shift in the last third of the novel. "Fear" and "Flight" are driven by violent, fast-paced action and terse, concrete prose that has been called some of the best suspense writing in American literature, but "Fate" is static, and Wright's prose moves toward the formality of exposition. This final section is often openly propagandistic, as Wright uses Boris Max to articulate the theoretical basis for Bigger's rebellion. In effect, "Fate" is as much an explication of what has preceded it as it is a conclusion to the narrative.

In Native Son, Wright uses the same combination of direct, naturalistic prose and symbolism that he employed in Uncle Tom's Children. He carefully reconstructs the physical reality of South Side Chicago, using materials gathered from sociological studies as well as from his own experience. He then skillfully invests objects with symbolic significance, a technique that helps him overcome the linguistic limitations of his inarticulate protagonist.

The most striking characteristic of Wright's method in Native Son is the stylistic shift in the last third of the novel. "Fear" and "Flight" are driven by violent, fast-paced action and terse, concrete prose that has been called some of the best suspense writing in American literature, but "Fate" is static, and Wright's prose moves toward the formality of exposition, explaining rather than showing the reasons for Bigger's behavior. This final section is often openly propagandistic, as Wright uses Boris Max to articulate the theoretical basis for Bigger's rebellion. In effect, "Fate" is as much an explication of what has preceded it as it is a conclusion to the narrative.

Called the black version of Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy, Native Son more closely resembles the naturalistic works of Dreiser, Sherwood Anderson, and Sinclair Lewis than did Uncle Tom's Children, Wright's previous book. Bigger's willful violence makes him at best an anti-hero, and any hope for improvement seems remote. Wright's careful documentation of Bigger's condition and his reproduction of newspaper accounts are reminiscent of the popular social novels written by John Dos Passes, John Steinbeck, and James T. Farrell. At its worst moments, Native Son echoes the cold, analytical prose of much proletarian literature.

In Native Son Wright shifted his focus from the South to the problems of urban blacks in the North, but his picture of a two-tiered society based on racial discrimination and the protection of property rights remained the same. Although the racist thugs of Uncle Tom's Children are replaced by avaricious landlords, irresponsible journalists, and brutal police in Native Son, the slums of South Side Chicago, like the rural South portrayed in Uncle Tom's Children (1938), are places in which the dreams of success are available to all but the means to achieve them are restricted to the few.

The particular hardships of black residents of South Side Chicago are set against the background of the Great Depression, political corruption, wealthy capitalists, and urban blight. Native Son explores the social unrest created by the hard economic times, particularly the interest in radical political solutions represented by Marxists such as Jan Erlone and Boris Max.

In creating Native Son, Wright was able to use his personal experience of nearly ten years' residence in South Side Chicago, sociological studies of Chicago compiled by Louis Wirth, and considerable material taken directly from the highly publicized trial of a Chicago black man named Robert Nixon. Nixon was eventually convicted and electrocuted for murdering a woman with a brick, and at one point, he was defended by the leftist International Labor Defense, but Wright made most use of the sensational, racist media coverage of the Nixon trial.

Additional Commentary

Native Son depicts a world that is psychologically and physically brutal. Wright graphically portrays the emotional trauma that his black characters suffer because of white dominance, and he describes in gruesome detail the violence that accompanies Bigger's anger. Bigger saws off Mary's head; he smashes Bessie's face with a brick; he contemplates rape; he has no guilt for retribution against whites, no sympathy for religion or kindness. He is, as many critics have noted, one of the most despicable protagonists in literature. But Wright's defenders also note that the absence of morality provides a vehicle for looking at the raw reality of Bigger's world—a world that, for a part of his life, was Wright's own reality. In the tradition of naturalistic fiction, Native Son examines the cruelty of nature's indifference, and the evil that occurs because of humankind's intervention. In spite of its positive ending, in which the reader understands that Bigger can die fulfilled because he has found his identity, the novel will offend everyone, which is its purpose.

1940s: Workers during the Great Depression are faced with unemployment rates as high as 25% and relief comes through socialistic government programs. The U.S. also increases defense spending as officials realize the nation will become involved in World War II.

Today: Unemployment stands around 6%, but corporate downsizing has many workers concerned about their future. The government must reduce a multibillion dollar deficit, yet the stock market continues its strong performance.

1940s: Blacks are excluded from the suburban housing boom of the era. The Federal Housing Authority practices “redlining”: on city maps it draws red lines around predominantly black inner-city areas and refuses to insure loans for houses in those areas. This practice contributes to the demise of the inner city.

Today: Though many upper- and middle-class blacks live and work in the suburbs, poor blacks are often confined to substandard housing in decaying urban areas, or ghettos.

1940s: Race relations are tense as blacks grow frustrated with segregation and discrimination. In southern states, poll taxes and literacy tests are used to prevent blacks from voting. Tempers explode during race riots in Detroit and Harlem in the summer of 1943.

Today: Though civil rights legislation enacted during the 1960s has improved the conditions of minorities, particularly African Americans, the nation was polarized along racial lines in the debates over the Rodney King and O. J. Simpson trials.

Called the black version of An American Tragedy (Dreiser, 1925), Native Son adheres more closely to the naturalistic method practiced by Theodore Dreiser, Sherwood Anderson, and Sinclair Lewis than Uncle Tom's Children had. Bigger's willful violence makes him at best an antihero, and any hope for melioration seems remote. Wright's careful documentation of Bigger's condition and his reproduction of newspaper accounts is reminiscent of the popular social novels written by John Dos Passos, John Steinbeck, and James T. Farrell. At its worst moments, Native Son echoes the cold, analytical prose of much proletarian literature.

Native Son is an extension of Wright's work in Uncle Tom's Children, and it is not difficult to imagine Bigger Thomas as a direct descendant of Big Boy from "Big Boy Leaves Home," but Native Son is also a reaction against the sentiment of Wright's earlier stories. Wright himself complained that Uncle Tom's Children had been "a book even bankers' daughters could read and weep over and feel good about." He wanted Native Son to "be so hard and deep that they would have to face it without the consolation of tears." Thus, he consciously worked to toughen his novel and the character of Bigger Thomas.

Although critics generally have felt that Wright's existential writing marks a distinct break from his earlier work, The Outsider has many parallels with Native Son. Cross Damon is, to some extent, an articulate and educated version of Bigger Thomas. Both characters share a pervasive sense of alienation, and each resorts to violence to justify his existence.

The first significant adaptation of Native Son, a dramatization that Wright coauthored with Paul Green, was successfully produced on Broadway by John Houseman and Orson Welles less than a year after the novel's publication. This Mercury Theater production starred Canada Lee.

The first film version was an amateurish production filmed in Argentina and released in 1950. It is notable because Wright himself played the lead role of Bigger Thomas. A controversial film version released in 1986 starred Victor Love, Elizabeth McGovern, Matt Dillon, Oprah Winfrey, Akousa Buisa, Willard Pugh, Geraldine Page, Carroll Baker, and John Karlen. Producer Diane Silver and director Jerrold Friedman fought over the inclusion of Bessie Mears's murder, and Silver's ultimate decision to eliminate Bigger's brutal act caused some reviewers to complain that the film softens and distorts Wright's novel.

Richard Wright himself starred in a low budget film adaptation of Native Son in 1950. The film, directed by Pierre Chenal, is available on video from Classic Pictures Incorporated.

Native Son was adapted to film in 1987. The film, directed by Jerrold Freedmand, starred Victor Love as Bigger Thomas, Elizabeth McGovern as Mary Dalton, Oprah Winfrey as Mrs. Thomas, and Matt Dillon as Jan Erlone. The film was produced by Diane Silver for Cinecom Pictures.

Several recordings have been made of the novel. The most recent one was done in 1991 by Caedmon Productions.

Richard Wright gave a talk on March 12, 1940, at Columbia University which explained his ideas about Bigger Thomas in Native Son. This talk has since been published as “How ‘Bigger’ Was Born” and is included in most recent editions of the novel.

Avery, Evelyn Gross. Rebels and Victims: The Fiction of Richard Wright and Bernard Malamud. Port Washington, NY: Kennikat Press, 1979. Discusses Wright's protagonists as examples of alienated black rebellion.

Baldwin, James. Notes of a Native Son. Boston: Beacon Press, 1955. Includes "Everybody's Protest Novel" and "Many Thousands Gone," essays that criticize Wright for sensationalizing and exaggerating black life.

Bone, Robert. Richard Wright. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, 1969. A short pamphlet that effectively introduces Wright's work and explores his attraction to existentialism.

Brignano, Richard. Richard Wright: An Introduction to the Man and His Works. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1970. A thematically arranged study that includes a particularly thorough examination of Wright's use of Marxism.

Fabre, Michel. The Unfinished Quest of Richard Wright. New York: William Morrow, 1973. A complete and reliable biography that includes critical evaluation of Wright's work.

The World of Richard Wright. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1985. A collection of essays that is particularly useful in understanding Wright's exile and his relationship to existentialism.

Hakutani, Yoshinobu. Critical Essays on Richard Wright. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1982. A valuable collection of original and reprinted articles that covers the range of Wright's fiction and nonfiction, and an introduction that provides a thorough overview of the relevant criticism.

Kinnamon, Keneth. The Emergence of Richard Wright: A Study in Literature and Society. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1973. Critical and biographical study that examines Wright's development up to the publication of Native Son.

Margolies, Edward. The Art of Richard Wright. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1969. The first booklength study to focus on Wright as an artist as well as a proletarian writer.

Sources

James Baldwin, “Many Thousands Gone,” in Partisan Review, Vol. XVIII, 1955, pp. 665-80.

David Bradley, “On Rereading Native Son,” in The New York Times, December 7, 1986, pp. 68-79.

Robert Butler, Native Son: The Emergence of a New Black Hero, Twayne Publishers, 1991, 132 p.

Ralph Ellison, “The World and the Jug,” in New Leader, Vol. XLVI, December 9, 1963, pp. 22-6.

Hilary Holladay, “Native Son’s Guilty Man,” in The CEA Critic, Winter, 1992, pp. 30-6.

Irving Howe, “Black Boys and Native Sons,” in A World More Attractive, Horizon Press, 1963, pp. 98-110.

Joseph Hynes, “Native Son Fifty Years Later,” in Cimarron Review, January, 1993, pp. 91-97.

Maria K. Mootry, “Bitches, Whores, and Woman Haters: Archetypes and Typologies in the Art of Richard Wright,” in Richard Wright: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Richard Macksey and Frank E. Moorer, Prentice Hall, 1984.

Charles Poore, review in the New York Times, March 1, 1940, p. 19.

Theodore Solotaroff, “The Integration of Bigger Thomas” (1964), in his The Red Hot Vacuum & Other Pieces on the Writings of the Sixties, Atheneum, 1970, pp. 122-32.

For Further Study

Richard Abcarian, Negro American Literature, Wadworth, California, 1970. A fundamental commentary on African American literature, its roots, and importance in the canon. There is a significant discussion of Richard Wright’s novel.

Gordon W. Allport, The Nature of Prejudice, Cambridge, 1954. A fundamental source to understand the problem of prejudice and racism in general and concepts such as visibility and difference.

James Baldwin, “Many Thousands Gone,” in Partisan Review, Vol. XVIII, 1955, pp. 665-80. Baldwin argues that “protest” novels, like Native Son, do little to advance the cause of racial justice in America.

James Baldwin, Nobody Knows My Name, Dell, 1961. Baldwin’s essays about African Americans and Black literature. Some of them include references to his mentor, Richard Wright, whom he later rejected.

Russel Carl Brignans, “Richard Wright: An Introduction to The Man and His Works,” University of Pittsburgh Press, 1970, p. 147. Brignans posits that Bigger Thomas was a precursor of the existentialist hero more closely associated with French literature.

Arthur Davis and Michael W. Peplow, Anthology of Negro American Literature, Holt, New York, 1975. A collection of critical essays on African American literature, including Richard Wright’s texts, plus a very clear and interesting introduction.

Ralph Ellison, “The World and the Jug,” in New Leader, Vol. XLVI, December 9, 1963, pp. 22-6. Ellison believes Native Son has an aesthetically narrow view of the black experience in America because it is filtered through a sociopath, Bigger Thomas.

Leslie Fiedler, “Negro and Jew: Encounter in America,” in No! In Thunder, Stein and Day, New York, 1972. This article investigates the relationships between Jews and African Americans in the United States. Useful to understand the relationship between Bigger and Jan.

Katherine Fishburn, Richard Wright’s Hero: The Faces of a Rebel-Victim, Scarecrow Press, 1977. Fishburn declares that Bigger is an anti-hero whose quest for freedom leads to his ultimate alienation from the world.

Irving Howe, “Black Boys and Native Sons,” in A World More Attractive, Horizon Press, 1963, pp. 98-110. Defending Wright against Ellison and Baldwin, Howe asserts that Native Son continues the tradition of black protest through literature and takes that protest to a higher level.

Dale McLemore, Racial and Ethnic Relations in America, Boston, 1980. An advanced study of the subject of ethnic relations in the United States with a large section devoted to African Americans and a discussion of cultural versus racial differences.

Maria K. Mootry, “Bitches, Whores, and Woman Haters: Archetypes and Typologies in the Art of Richard Wright,” in Richard Wright: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Richard Macksey and Frank E. Moorer, Prentice Hall, 1984. Mootry asserts that Bigger is unable to see women as human beings who have the same rights to expression as he does. Consequently, this restricted view makes his self-destruction a foregone conclusion.

Toni Morrison, Playing in the Dark, Whiteness and the Literary Imagination, Picador, 1992. This work contains the ideas of the Noble Prize winner about African American literature: its roots, purposes, and future.

Charles Poore, review in the New York Times, March 1, 1940, p. 19. Poore sums up the excitement surrounding the release of Native Son.

Louis Tremaine, “The Dissociated Sensibility of Bigger Thomas in Native Son” in Studies in American Fiction, Vol. 14, No. 1, Spring, 1986, pp. 63-76. Tremaine views Bigger as a man hungering for selfexpression even though he knows that expression is denied him.