A review by shelleebee
Black Boy by Richard Wright

4.0

Richard Wright's memoir makes the Jim Crow south feel like a waking nightmare. The details about Chicago and the racism that created the segregation of the city seem both foreign and completely relevant to the 21st century. His description of the Communist party of the 1930s and its support of Blacks but ultimate failure was also interesting. Wright is a lonely child, young man, and adult, terrorized by the violence and oppression that surround him but eager to make a change. His only solace comes through literature. A serious young man, he works tenaciously to leave the south and then to earn a living through writing. This book is an excellent companion to his novel Native Son and a riveting historical look at post-emancipation enslavement of Blacks.