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Home , Bigger Thomas, Native Son, Richard Wright (author)

Socialism and Identity in the Life and Works of *

Fecha de recepción: 18 de junio de 2014 Fecha de aprobación: 21 de noviembre de 2014

Abstract

Richard Wright was a pioneer in whose Juan D. Gómez relationship with socialism helped to define him as a person and Universidad de Antioquia as a writer. The inspiration behind his literary accomplishments [email protected] and their impact on his contemporaries can be understood by tracing two of the most important themes in his life; socialism Docente Instituto de Filosofía, Uni- and identity. This article describes the evolution of his relationship versidad de Antioquia. Miembro with socialism in order to better understand the writer and his best del Grupo de Filosofía y Literatura. known works in their social and political context. This exercise Miembro de la Modern Language As- sociation. can also help us to gain a clearer understanding of the cultural and social implications of socialist ideology in the United States after the First World War. Key words: Richard Wright, , racism, politics, socialism

* Artículo de reflexión auspiciado por el Instituto de Filosofía de la Universidad de Antio- quia y hace parte de la producción del Grupo de Filosofía y Literatura.

Citar: Gómez, J.D. (julio-diciembre de 2015). Socialism and identity in the life and works of Richard Wright. La palabra, (27), 33 - 43.

33 la palabra No. 27 Tunja, julio - diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 Socialismo e identidad en la vida y obra de Richard Wright Resumen Richard Wright fue un pionero en la literatura americana cuya relación con el socialismo ayudo a definirlo como persona y como escritor. La inspiración detrás de sus logros literarios y su impacto en sus contemporáneos pueden ser entendidos mediante el trazado de dos de los temas más importantes de su vida; el socialismo y la identidad. En este artículo se describe la evolución de su relación con el socialismo, a fin de comprender mejor al escritor y sus obras más conocidas en su contexto social y político. Este ejercicio también puede ayudar a obtener una comprensión más clara de las implicaciones culturales y sociales de la ideología socialista en los Estados Unidos después de la Primera Guerra Mundial.

Palabras Claves: Richard Wright, comunismo, racismo, política, socialismo Socialisme et identité dans la vie et l’œuvre de Richard Wright

Résumé: Richard Wright fut un pionnier de la littérature américaine. Son rapport avec le socialisme a été essentiel dans son parcours personnel et littéraire. L’inspiration, source de ses réussites littéraires et l’impact qu’il a eu sur ses contemporains, peuvent être compris à la lumière de deux thèmes ayant été importants pour lui : le socialisme et l’identité. L’article met en perspective l’évolution de son rapport au socialisme pour mieux cerner l’écrivain et ses œuvres majeures inscrites dans un contexte socio-politique précis. Cet exercice permet de mieux comprendre les influences socio-culturelles du socialisme aux États-Unis après la Première Guerre Mondiale. Mots clés: Richard Wright, communisme, racisme, politique, socialisme

la palabra No. 27 tunja, Julio - Diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 34 Socialism and identity in the life and works of Richard Wright Juan D. Gómez

identity known and of incor- that these black men were porating himself into the larger dupes who naively thought of The life and works of Richard whole. themselves as practicing a kind Wright provide a unique view of of magic and hoped that if “… the important role that socialist He had unpropitious begin- they acted like the men who ideology played in the life of nings, and seemed destined to a overthrew the Czar, then surely many before life of anonymity similar to that they ought to win their freedom the Second World War. Through of Richard Vincent. Wright was in America” (Wright, 1983, pp. his short stories, novels, and born on September 4, 1908, on 37-38). poems, which are in many ways Rucker’s plantation, some twen- an extension of the author’s ty miles outside of Natchez, Like many others in Chicago struggles and evolving beliefs, Mississippi. When he was five, during the Depression, Wright Wright works through many his family moved to Memphis survived through a combination of the hopes and challenges and his father abandoned them. of sporadic employment and that came with seeing socialist When Richard was eleven, his public assistance. For a time, he ideology as a possible ally in the mother suffered a paralyzing worked in a post office where quest for racial equality in the stroke and the family was bro- he befriended white men who United States. ken up. Wright moved in with introduced him to the John Reed his illiterate and devout grand- Club, a national communist The search for identity mother who interpreted his organization that sought to In a nation devoted to the prop- restless mind and independent recruit writers and intellectuals. osition of promoting and recog- spirit as signs of spiritual per- Wright was skeptical about nizing autonomous individuals, dition and saw it as her duty white/communist interest in Richard Wright’s family could to return him to the fold. She black welfare but he was won trace their pursuit of this ideal set about doing this by restrict- over and eventually became one back to the . ing his access to books and the of the converted. He quickly When a Union soldier named outside world (Rowley, 2001, p. rose through the ranks from Richard Wilson went through 10). recruit to executive secretary the discharge process at the end of the Chicago chapter and, At the age of 19, in search of for the first time in his life, of the Civil War, his name was opportunities that would allow entered into the veteran’s reg- found himself surrounded by him to define himself, he moved like-minded individuals that istry as Richard Vincent. Wil- to Chicago. He was surprised son, who was Richard Wright’s valued him for his ideas and by the absence of Jim Crow imagination. maternal grandfather, spent the restrictions there and heartened rest of his life trying to convince by the possibility of living his the government that he had The club provided an ideology life without the fear of lynching. that opposed his grandmother’s fought in the war and, more It was in there where he had his importantly, that he existed and benighted mysticism and a first contact with communists. movement that engaged in an deserved the same government He saw their marches, and pension to which other veterans organized search for the truth sometimes he witnessed black in the lives of the oppressed were entitled. Throughout his men among them, parading and life and in his works of fiction and isolated (Gayle, 1980, p. mimicking the mannerisms of 68). Here, at last, he had found Wright was involved in a simi- white communists. Wright was lar struggle- that of making his what he needed: an identity unimpressed and concluded beyond the procrustean norms

35 la palabra No. 27 Tunja, julio - diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 that white society imposed and personal as any religion. Like in 1938. In this collection, we a means to challenge them. Six the Christianity practiced find Wright’s first complete years later, when the Soviet-Nazi by his enslaved ancestors, its artistic engagement with the pact caused many to abandon form of practice changed but possibilities and tensions that the party, Wright remained. he never abandoned the ideal existed between race, socialism, He explained his position by because the cause was essential religion, and collective identity. saying, “Communism is for me to who he was. This remained He hoped to exploit these a way of life, a spectacle of life, true even when those who possibilities and resolve the an unusual mode of existence, introduced him to it, and those tensions that emerged from an intense drama … millions, who claimed sole representation them lest they undermine black regardless of the tactics of the of it, would turn oppressive and unity and his own fragile and U.S.S.R stand firm,for there is tyrannical. developing sense of self1. nothing to go back to” (Gayle, 1980, p. 123; emphasis added). The works that WrightThe possibilities and risks can published during this time, be seen in all of the stories It was during his John Reed poems like “A Red Love in UTC whose protagonists membership that Wright’s Note”, and “I Have Seen Black engage in varying degrees long harbored feelings of Hands” voice his hope that of rebellion and collective indignation, frustration, and the Party would provide the resistance. This resistance is hope for a better future founded organizational structure that sometimes organized around on reason and justice were could bring blacks together the black church and, to a transformed into social activism, and thrust them into an active lesser extent, the Communist artistic production, and socialist role in the political, economic, Party. The first three stories militancy. Socialism gave him a and social life of the country. carry a warning to the enemy collective identity. It allowed his At the same time, poems like (read, capitalists and racists) by isolated suffering to be projected “”, a highlighting some of the violent onto a global stage where his disturbingly vivid description of possibilities inherent in all individual tale became one a lynching, remind the reader of abusive relationships and warn with that of millions of others; the barbaric violence that whites blacks about the ineffectiveness their plight became part of were allowed to inflict on blacks of pursuing individual actions. his life and he became part of with impunity in parts of the The implication being that their struggle. He wrote, “I was country. only a communal movement, a communist because I was a based on an established (black- Negro. Indeed the Communist The acclaimed writer communist) group identity has a chance of succeeding. Party had been the only road In 1936, his short story, “Big Boy out of the black belt for me. Leaves Home”, was included in The protagonists in these Hence communism had not . The New Caravan Anthology stories, two men and an been for me simply a fad, a This story, along with “Fire and adolescent are forced to choose hobby; it had a deep functional Cloud”, which won the National between submission and self- for my life” (Fabre, Fiction Contest in 1937, and assertion. All three choose the 1993, p. 23). Socialist ideology others were published together latter for different reasons and was for him a belief system as as Uncle Tom’s Children (UTC)

1 For more on the tensions inherent in the interactions between race, socialism, and religion see Hakutani, 1996. la palabra No. 27 tunja, Julio - Diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 36 Socialism and identity in the life and works of Richard Wright Juan D. Gómez with different consequences, presenting a class uprising as help to define revolutionary but an undertone of rebellion imminent. “Fire and Cloud” consciousness. Through and attempts at self-definition and “Bright and Morning these stories, Wright tries to are common to all three. The Star”, which were added to harmonize the source of black stories announce an end to black the 1940 edition, assume that unity- spiritual belief and submissiveness and forecast that class can be a greater historical socialist ideology, because he it is likely to be a violent one. determinant than race. In “Fire sees them as necessary catalysts and Cloud” Wright focuses for a new society to emerge and Big Boy, the title character in on the Church- the most also for a reconciliation between “Big Boy Leaves Home”, shoots important communal structure his own past and present. a white man who has killed one in southern black society. The of his friends; Brother Mann Reverend Dan Taylor, torn The heroine in “Bright and in “Down by the Riverside” between his responsibility to Morning Star” is a generation kills a white postmaster in self- his congregation and fear for his ahead of Reverend Taylor defense; and Silas, in “Long life, vacillates between joining in political enlightenment. Black Song”, whips a white the communists in a march to Her faith in the communist salesman who has seduced his demand food from the local cause is as strong as her faith pregnant wife. When the white government and yielding to in Christ and this, instead of salesman’s friend comes to help, the threats made by the town’s dividing her spiritual strength, Silas shoots him. When the officials. After being kidnapped has the effect of doubling her authorities arrive, he hunkers and whipped, Taylor allows capacity for courageous action. down in his house, shoots back, that and Christianity There is no time for gradual and burns it to the ground. may in fact be compatible for assimilation in this story and Silas is exceptional in that he political purposes. self-sacrifice is understood to is a black property owner and be the price of solidarity and is thus under the impression In the end, a crowd of poor ultimate victory. The heroine that he has an identity of sorts blacks and whites march has one son imprisoned for within the capitalist system. together and have their demands being a communist and she is Despite this, he suffers the same met by the mayor. The march willing to watch the sheriff and shows how through religion fate as the non-owners in UTC. his mob torture a second son in His wife is also presented as and socialism a new collective order to protect the identities of an extension of his property, identity can be achieved and comrades in her cell. Although property that is unlawfully how the racial identities that the story ends with the death taken from him. The message predominate can be supplanted of our heroine and her son, here is that only a collective to the benefit of all. This joining there is an understood sense socialist-racial identity can have of the Christian vision and the of accomplishment because some staying power and that new Marxism is meant to bring the group is now stronger. It believing in an individual sense class-consciousness to Reverend is composed of individuals of self in a capitalist society is, at Taylor’s congregation. By who place its survival above best, delusional. uniting the cultural strength their own, who have come to of the citizens with the a communal identity through The last two stories in UTC try guided political action of the suffering and are autonomous to hasten the working classes communists, Christianity individuals defined by their to revolutionary action by becomes not a foe to Marxism own principles and actions but a tactical ally that can

37 la palabra No. 27 Tunja, julio - diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 rather than by those who seek he was not familiar. Wright and they were not interested in to exploit them. summarized his situation thus: the rest of the country knowing “God I love these people but about their lives. These stories show a transition I’m glad they’re not in power, or stage for Wright. He is no longer they’d shoot me” (Wright, 1983, in the honeymoon stage of the Wright himself later became p. 119). He seemed to be back the object of government earlier poems, such as “A Red in the place from where he had Love Note” for example, but is persecution because of his hoped to escape. In Memphis, affiliation with the Communist trying to pave, through fiction, or in his grandmother’s house, a path that will lead African Party and his unyielding where he was forced to be who and sometimes militant Americans out of poverty, others thought he should be, oppression, violence, and into denunciations of racism in where his sense of self had to America. In 1940 he had a new sense of self. The path, bend to the will of those more he hopes, will be paved with his passport confiscated powerful. by authorities who tried socialist stones. Wright knew that the obstacles to achieving blackmailing him into signing Wright’s disagreement with the a declaration attesting to a class unity were many and he Party was not his only concern. devotes a substantial portion of communist conspiracy (Gayle, As part of the Federal Writers’ 1980, p. xiv). It was soon clear his most famous novel, Native Project (FWP), an effort to dis- to him that a new kind of Son, to addressing them. cover American culture through chauvinism was taking over in the voices of ex-slaves, facto- the United States, one in which The communist and the ry hands, and farm workers, American was synonymous Wright tried to bring the lives of with capitalist, communist black Americans to the public’s meant un-American, and black Before he could write Native Son attention by writing their histo- communists were doubly however, the uncompromising ry and articulating their collec- character and integrity that saw so because they had never tive identity. As anti-commu- been considered American him through violence, hunger, nist sentiment spread, the proj- and isolation, became the cause to begin with. Searching for ect drew the attention of Texas a way to engage with the of many of his problems with his congressman Martin Dies. Dies communist brethren. The Party political machine that refused chaired what was to become to recognize them as citizens, demanded conformity and the the House Un-American Ac- relationship could not last. Wright and others were labeled tivities Committee (HUAC) as traitors instead.2 Although his formal education and saw the FWP’s activities was not much more than that as a communist plot to subvert The red and the black forces that of the rank and file with whom American national identity; reactionary government officials he sought to work, his shined consequently the project was judged to be the principal threats shoes, clean shirt, and tie got terminated on the federal level to the status quo were conflated him labeled an intellectual. in 1939. The government was so that petitions for civil rights He began receiving threats on not interested in black Ameri- were labeled seditious. Despite his life; he was feared because cans discovering who they were this, Richard Wright remained

2 Gayle makes the case that the U.S. government, through the CIA and the FBI, continued to harass Wright overseas for his non-confor- mity and advocacy for the oppressed as they had done in the United States. la palabra No. 27 tunja, Julio - Diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 38 Socialism and identity in the life and works of Richard Wright Juan D. Gómez a speaker in the tradition of the conflict in Europe and resources of the novel” (Reilly, the oppressed and continued, many of the questions that 1978, p. 43). Some critics failed at great cost to himself and his Fascism raised. He tells us that to appreciate the importance of family, to confront power with Bigger, as a dispossessed and what the novel exposed; Clifton truth. disinherited man without any Fadiman of The New Yorker positive sense of self, “… carried wrote that Wright was less than Wright left Chicago for New in him the potentialities of a finished novelist and that his York and took with him the either communism or fascism.” melodramatic plot was peopled ideology that had become a and that he (Wright) came to with paper-thin characters complement to his identity understand the moods and (Reilly, 1978, p. 47). What no as a black man and as a writer. impulses of blacks in Chicago one could deny however was His interest now lay in distilling by learning about Russian life that Wright had acquired a new from the Garveyist and Black under the Czars (Wright, 1993, and paradoxical identity: he Nationalist movements a p. 521, 518). And although had become the first black best- program for black unity that is not exactly selling author.3 was guided by the principles and a revolutionary, even Wright ideals of socialism. It was with tells us that he recognized in his In Native Son it is the denial these concerns in mind that he character impulses that “… were of identity and alienation that set himself to write Native Son. present in the vast upheavals in young black men (to say noth- Russia and Germany” (Wright, ing of the women who are al- Native Son depicts a time and 1993, p. 529). He is tragic, and most always worse off ) face that place in which the possibility of precipitates tragedy. Wright saw a significant socialist presence Wright’s lecture is instructive because in it we see that for this sense of exclusion as a threat in American politics was real. to them and to anyone else who The moment was brief but its him the black struggle and his socialist ideals were inseparable chanced to be near. Bigger consequences helped to define Thomas, like the author, is sel- the future of the movement parts of the self that he saw himself to be. dom perceived as a whole per- for racial equality in the U.S. son. Throughout the novel he is In it, Wright presents the racial The initial response to the novel quartered and objectified by the divide in the U.S. as a conflict was unmistakably favorable. whites in power and responds with consequences of national It was chosen as a Book of the by alternating between periods magnitude. The future of the Month Club selection and of dejected impotence and rage. country, Wright contends, sold exceedingly well; Lewis Wright explains Bigger’s alien- would be defined in large part Gannet’s review in The New York ation through the prism of di- by its ability to acknowledge Herald Tribune likened it to alectical materialism so that the its biracial identity. In “How Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath and novel’s social protest is founded Bigger Was Born”, a lecture Charles Poore of The New York on the socialist theoretical con- given by Wright at Columbia Times declared that it had been structs with which Wright was University in March of 1940, a long time since he encountered familiar. Within this paradigm, he explains the birth of Native “… a novelist who had such white people, who represent the Son’s protagonist through a command of the techniques and oppositional force that Bigger geopolitical prism that includes

3 In 1939, Wright declared earnings of $2,585, and in 1940, close to $30,000 (Fabre 249). 4 The socialist theme is at times over represented when Wright displaces the racial agenda by forcing abstract theoretical observations onto the story of Bigger Thomas.

39 la palabra No. 27 Tunja, julio - diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 perceives as the most danger- she will be old enough to work. unhealthy and, although he was ous to him, manifest their pow- Bigger’s girlfriend Bessie earns strong enough to end it, the er over him through material just enough as a cleaning woman process proved to be lengthy forms.4 to sustain herself, and arrives and painful. home numbed by exhaustion. These characters live on the The communists in the Bigger is very much like novel are misunderstood and any other young black man fringes of the capitalist system and are therefore denied the misunderstand. They are moved living in Chicago’s Southside by egalitarian principles but except for that a charitable privilege of a social identity in the world of whites; they are their strategy for realizing them organization run by Mr. Dalton, is most often ineffective and the wealthiest real estate man unable to have lives of their own because their days are taken up sometimes counterproductive in Chicago, has chosen to (Galllagher, 2009, p. 5). Wright award him with a life altering by the unending struggle for survival. Without a job, Bigger’s sympathizes with their position opportunity, to become a driver and places them on the right for the Dalton family. At the only sense of community comes from his accomplices; with side of the argument, but his intersection of these two worlds reservations about politics lies the heart of the novel. Bigger them he robs black merchants in the neighborhood so that he and communism in particular accidentally kills Mr. Dalton’s are deep-set. He had, by this daughter, disposes of her body can have money for cigarettes and booze. The racial oppression point in his life, had enough in the basement furnace, and experience with the inhibiting a short manhunt ensues; these in Native Son is codified into a system of social relations of qualities of Party bureaucracy events take place in the “Fear” and the impractical effects and “Flight” sections of the power that are defined by the distribution of wealth. For of its dogmatism to know its novel. In the “Fate” section, limitations. Still, the central Bigger murders his girlfriend, is individual characters, self- realization is a commodity to role played by the communists captured, and brought to court in Native Son would lead us to face the death penalty. He which they are denied access because they are poor. to conclude that for Wright, is defended by a communist the Party was certainly better lawyer and loses. The representation of the Com- than anything available in the munist Party in the novel echoes past and, for some, the best The plot ofNative Son is Wright’s personal evolution in of what the present had to directed at exposing the that it is ambiguous and mea- offer. economic factors that underlie sured. Wright gives the Party a the subhuman conditions in role to play through Jan Erlone, When Irving Howe said of which black Chicagoans in Na- the concerned and committed that it was a novel that the 1930’s were forced to live. tive Son communist, and Boris Max, the “… made impossible a repeti- The few black characters that earnest but ineffective comrade. tion of the old lies …”, (Howe, Bigger comes into contact with This lack of consistency in rep- 1963, p. 354) he was referring are constant reminders of the resenting the Party illustrates to race relations in the U.S. But economic power of whites. the ideological shift that Wright he could just as well have meant His mother, sister, and brother faced in his move away from it that in this novel, and those that survive on public assistance. His and toward socialist ideals. His followed, it was impossible for sister Vera takes sewing classes relationship with the Party was Wright to repeat the old lies and hopes for the day when la palabra No. 27 tunja, Julio - Diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 40 Socialism and identity in the life and works of Richard Wright Juan D. Gómez about communism because the closer to American capitalism. is an extension of Wright’s circumstances demanded that He continued to write against socialist position and includes he address the issue of race and white supremacy and imperial- themes of isolation and the class relations from a new van- ism both at home and abroad. search for a stable identity tage point. Class unity provided In essays like “I Bite the Hand that Wright would give a more Wright with this, with a new That Feeds Me”, “Blueprint for complete presentation to in the paradigm with which to address Negro Writing”, and “White novel that marks the beginning the racial problem and with a Man Listen” he adapts literary of his existentialist phase, The means to indict the failure of techniques in order to produce Outsider (1953). the U.S. to live up to its ideals. works of social and political protest. The protagonist in The Outsider The search for a new iden- is Cross Damon, a character tity In 1941 he married a communist free of conventional morality, organizer from inhibitions, and the collective In the works that Wright pub- named Ellen Poplar even as norms of conscience. He tries to lished after Native Son he at- his relationship with the Party create an identity for himself by tempted to develop this new deteriorated to an irreparable rebelling against those around paradigm, one that tries to state and it authorized actions him. He despises communists 6 bridge the racial past with a against him. Also in that year, and fascists who he concludes socialist future (Kinnamon, Wright became the subject of an to be equally ruthless, cynical, 1990, p. 3).5 One example of investigation by J. Edgar Hoover and far from revolutionary. He this came in 1941 when Wright who received instructions attempts to create a sovereign and the photographer Edwin to this effect by Secretary of identity for himself by opposing Roskam published Twelve Mil- War Henry Stimson upon the the collective discipline around lion Black Voices: A Folk Story latter’s review of Twelve Million him, but as he lies on his of the Negro in the U.S. In it, Black Voices. Wright was again deathbed at the end of the novel Wright defines white power in a man against forces that saw he realizes that “Alone, man is the U.S. in economic terms by his beliefs as threatening. We nothing” (p. 585). The theme talking about “The Lords of the see this theme of one against of individual effort as futile Lands” and “The Bosses of the an intolerant society in his is present in Wright’s earliest Buildings” (Wright, 2008, p. next published work, the short works, as is that of the individual 49). He depicts the Jim Crow story titled: “The Man Who against the collective, both south as a place where racial op- Lived Underground” (1942). of which Wright experienced pression is but an appendage of Its protagonist, Fred Daniels, throughout his own life. a vaster and, in many respects, is a man in rebellion against a Twenty years after joining the more ruthless and imperson- society of money exchange and John Reed Club, Wright was al commodity-profit machine consumption. Like Bigger (and back where he started. He had (Wright, 1993, p. 515). His Wright), he is a black man who explored the limits of absolute disassociation from the Party is the object of a police manhunt freedom through did not mean that he was also because he is considered a threat and confirmed what he had renouncing Marxism or moving to the community. The story suspected when he joined the

5 This task was complicated because it was Wright’s emotional and subjective inclination to see history in terms of race and not class (Brignano, 1973, p. 93). 6 He would leave the Party in 1942 after a personal altercation with Benjamin Davis.

41 la palabra No. 27 Tunja, julio - diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 Party: that individual action know how deeply it impressed philosophy as dangerous and is futile and that in isolation, me” (as cited in Gayle, 1980, p. his public appeal as spokesman there is little hope for a healthy 178). Its representation of Jim for colonized peoples a tool that self, and life is painful to bear. Crow life angered many in the the and China In The Outsider he returned to South and the book was banned (particularly during the Korean those themes that first brought in several southern cities. Its War) were using to score points him to the Party: the need portrayal of the Communist against the U.S. When Wright for emotional attachment, Party as authoritarian upset the died in a hospital in 1960, compassion, and solidarity. organization and led to more his reputation was a shade of Through existentialism, Wright attacks on Wright. what it had been during the ear- learned how individuals could ly 1940s. resist the restrictions that the The end of the war brought in- world imposed upon them. creased government scrutiny of Wright’s life, like that of many This influence can be seen in communists. This and the Par- of his protagonists was tragic, the development of Bigger, ty’s attacks on him created an at- but unlike theirs, it was not for who as the novel progresses, is mosphere in which Wright was naught. Through sheer obstina- transformed from a naturalistic glad to accept an invitation by cy and conviction he created a victim to an existential hero. the French government. Wright life and identity for himself; he Subsequently, Cross Damon would later be quoted as saying, made himself felt and because may be read as a variation on “Had I not left my native land of this he left his mark. His ex- protagonists who, like Wright, … I would have perished in the periences as a child of the De- pay a heavy price for their atmosphere of political hysteria pression and as a black man in a emancipation. of McCarthyism” (Gayle, 1980, hostile and racist society result- p. 195).7 Having lived his life ed in his wholehearted embrace Wright continued to ride in a country that had kept him of the Party and, afterwards, of Native Son’s wave of popularity an outsider from its culture and socialism. His literary works are throughout the first half of institutions, Wright was forced a testament to the evolution of the forties. He lectured, went to impose exile status on him- his political beliefs and illus- on book tours, and published self. His declining popularity trate some of the cultural effects short stories. In 1945 his did not, however, diminish his of socialist ideology. The degree autobiographical active involvement in social and of faith that Wright had in the also appeared as a Book of the political causes that had helped collectivist and proletariat ideal Month Selection and received to define him and that earned provides a glimpse of the poten- general applause from the press. him the attention of govern- tial that socialism had to influ- This book also received praise ment agencies. After moving ence disenfranchised Americans from respected novelists such as to Paris, Wright’s professional and of the wider social reper- William Faulkner, who wrote to success was consistently under- cussions that could have taken 8 Wright, “It needed to be said and mined by the U.S. government. place in the U.S. had socialism you said it well.” Henry Miller The State Department, CIA, taken root. wrote, “I wanted to let you and FBI saw Wright’s political

7 and , also eager to flee the growing storm being fanned by the HUAC would follow, in 1948 in 1953 respectively. 8 In March of 1954, Native Son was removed from the public library in Galion, Ohio, in accordance with the anti-communist oath taken by all public educators. The Federal Loyalty Program to root out communism and those engaged in conduct “… likely to be contrary to the interests of the U.S.” was initiated by President Truman’s Executive Order 9835 (Gayle, 1980, p. 253). la palabra No. 27 tunja, Julio - Diciembre de 2015, ISSN 0121-8530 pp. 33-43 42 Socialism and identity in the life and works of Richard Wright Juan D. Gómez

References Brignano, R.C. (1973). Richard Wright: An Introduction to the Man and His Works. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press. Fabre, M. (1993). The Unfinished Quest of Richard Wright. Urbana-Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press. Gallagher, K. (2009). Bigger’s Great Leap to the Figurative. In H. Bloom (Ed.), Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Richard Wright’s Native Son. (pp. 3-18). New York, NY: Infobase Publishing. Gayle, A. (1980). Richard Wright an Ordeal of a Native Son. New York, NY: Anchor Publishing. Hakutani, Y. (1996). Richard Wright and Racial Discourse. Missouri: University of Missouri Press. Howe, I. (1963, Autumn). Black Boys and Native Sons. Dissent, 353-368. Kinnamon, K. (Ed.). (1990). New Essays on Native Son. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Reilly, J. (Ed.). (1978). Richard Wright: The Critical Reception. New York, NY: Burt Franklyn and Company. Rowley, H. (2001). Richard Wright: The Life and Times. Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press. Wright, R. (1934, January). A Red Love Note. Left Front: 3. Wright, R. (1934, June). I Have Seen Black Hands. : 16. Wright, R. (1935, July). Between the World and Me. Partisan Review: 18-19. Wright, R. (1937). White Man Listen. Garden City, NY: Doubleday Press. Wright, R. (1940, June). I Bite the Hand that Feeds Me. Atlantic Monthly: 826-828. Wright, R. (1957). Pagan Spain. London, UK: The Bodley Head Press. Wright, R. (1961). Twelve Million Black Voices. New York, NY: Arno Press. Wright, R. (1983). American Hunger. New York, NY: Press. Wright, R. (1989). Black Boy. New York, NY: Harper Perennial Press. Wright, R. (1993). Native Son: and How Bigger was Born. New York, NY: Harper Perennial Press. Wright, R. (1993). Uncle Tom’s Children. New York, NY: Harper Perennial. Wright, R. (1996). Eight Men: Stories by Richard Wright. New York, NY: Harper Perennial. Wright, R. (1937, Fall). Blueprint for Negro Writing. New Challenge, 2, 53–65. Wright, R. (2003). The Outsider. New York: Harper Perennial Press.

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