Richard Wright: The Life and Times Book

Born in Mississippi in 1908, the grandson of former slaves, Richard Wright spent his teenage years chopping wood, carrying coal, scrubbing floors, and enduring a thousand indignities. Later, in novels such as Native Son and The Outsider as well as works of journalism and autobiography, he raised profoundly disturbing questions about the "nightmarish jungle" of race relations in contemporary America, offering profoundly pessimistic answers in return. For his troubles, literary historian Hazel Rowley shows in this sweeping biography, Wright earned a large readership--even, for a time, a place on the bestseller lists and the top income-tax bracket. But, because he had joined the Communist Party as a young man, he was also denounced from the floor of the United States Senate--accused of anti-Americanism and even suspected of spying for Moscow--and his books were banned in several states and cities. Wright protested that he had repudiated Marxism years before, bitterly remarking, "The Western world must make up its mind as to whether it hates colored people more than it hates Communists." Eventually, a prophet without honor, he left his native country and lived out the rest of his years in France, where he is buried. Rowley draws on a wealth of archival material (as she notes, "Wright kept everything--drafts of manuscripts, letters, photographs, hotel bills, newspaper cuttings") and his body of work to portray the justly angry writer. The result is a welcome contribution to literary and historical studies. --Gregory McNamee Read More