A fast-paced yet thought-provoking read, Richard Wright's Native Son managed to make some strong points regarding racism. After several days of class discussion, I think it is safe to say that this is a protest novel.
We are plunged into Bigger Thomas' world from the get go. In the first few pages, we witness him wake up in his family's one room apartment, eat breakfast, taunt his sister, then leave for the day a.k.a. go hang out with the gang. It's the way he acts around his gang that really shows us what his life amounts to. We see him joke around with Gus about being a pilot, because that is something he could never be. As Gus puts it, Bigger probably could be a pilot, but only if he had money and wasn't black. We continue to see Bigger's altered perspective on whites versus blacks when the gang tries to plan a robbery. Bigger's gang performs robberies all the time, but when a white owner's store is suggested, Bigger is secretly terrified. Of course, he doesn't dare show his emotions, and tries to turn it around onto Gus for the gang not being able to go.
Soon after this falling out, Bigger heads to the white part of town for a possible job. We see his character change dramatically as soon as he's away from his black pals and is faced with white people. He is painfully timid, his vocabulary diminished to "yessuh" and "no suh." Even though the Daltons consider themselves very liberal and try to make Bigger feel like an equal, he is just too petrified to consider them as anything other than white superiors. While Mr. Dalton is firm yet kind towards Bigger, it is his flamboyant daughter Mary that really rubs Bigger the wrong way. Her brash actions really take him aback, and he is constantly worried about him potentially losing his job because of her. Later on that night, we see that he really took this risk to the next level.
After an awkward night of partying with Jan and Mary, Bigger kills Mary. Her drunken slurs are very uncalled for when her mother enters the room, and Bigger accidentally stifles her to death. Even though this was a total accident, he doesn't even give himself the benefit of the doubt and immediately believes that he's a cold blooded murderer. In his eyes, he is black, and guilty. It's as if he always kind of expected his life to end up this way. It's this kind of mentality that suggests he was brainwashed by society into believing he is inferior. After all, he is underprivileged, uneducated, and black.
Throughout the rest of the book we see him struggle with moral rights and wrongs--mostly wrongs--until he eventually gets caught. In Book Three the action slows, but this is when Wright presents his own opinions through the voice of Max, Bigger's Jewish, communist lawyer. While Max is never really expanded on as a character and doesn't try to prove that Bigger is innocent, he does try to make the court recognize the state of Bigger's environment, and why he is the way he is.
I agree with this depiction of Bigger as a product of his environment. While I don't believe that Bigger's actions can be excused, I definitely think that his upbringing and environment should be taken into account as to why he did the things he did.
