Richard Wright, Bigger Thomas, and the "Habit of Reflection"

Off and on for several years, I have taught Richard Wright's auotbiography, Black Boy, which is a book that an English teacher can easily grow to love: it's about the power of words, thoughts, language, ideas--the ability of these things to bring a human being up out of the misery and squalor that life presents to him and give him a sense of self. Feeling the need for a change, though, I decided to teach Native Son instead this year. As much as I love Black Boy, I don't think I'll be going back to it soon.

In Black Boy, Wright at one point refers to having developed the "habit of reflection"--I have often indicated to my students that I think this one phrase can almost in itself explain how Wright rises above the limitations placed on him. The habit of reflection ultimately gives him an understanding not only of himself but of the society that he lives in. It gives him a measure of control over his life. If there is anything like free will in our lives, it comes from this habit: from our ability, our power, to think deliberately about our own lives.

Native Son presents something different. There are glimpses of Bigger Thomas in Wright himself -- when he feels violent impulses welling up in him, when he bangs up against the limitations of the world he is in, when he writes that he knows he has to get out of the South because if he stays there he knows he will end up dead. But Wright, through the habit of reflection, escapes. Bigger does not. Wright's life story is bittersweet, poignant; Bigger's is shocking, incomprehensible. Wright finds the community he has always sought with the Communists he meets in Chicago and then is expelled from their midst, but Bigger never even gets that far, alien and alone. What strikes me most now about Native Son is the misery of Bigger's utter aloneness. It is parallel to the feelings Wright holds after his falling out with the Communists in Chicago, but the outcomes are vastly different: we are amazed that Wright manages not only to survive but to rise above the squalor of his environment, but it's no surprise that Bigger sinks to the depths.