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Uncle Tom's ChildrenOriginally published in 1938 by Harper and Brothers as Uncle Tom's Children: Four Novellas, the volume consisted of "Big Boy Leaves Home," "Down by the Riverside," "Long Black Song," and "Fire and Cloud." In 1940, Harper reissued the volume as Uncle Tom's Children: Five Long Stories, incorporating "Bright and Morning Star" as well as placing "The Ethics of Living Jim Crow" as the text's introduction. Reviewing the text for the Saturday Review of Literature (2 April 1938), Zora Neale Hurston wrote "This is a book about hatreds. Mr. Wright serves notice by his title that he speaks of a people in revolt, and his stories are so grim that the Dismal Swamp of race hatred must be where they live. Not one act of understanding and sympathy comes to pass in the entire work"[1]. Reviewing the text for the Partisan Review (May 1938), James T. Farrell wrote "Especially remarkable is the handling of dialogue. Richard Wright uses simple speech as a means of carrying on his narrative, as a medium for poetic and lyrical effects, and as an instrument of characterization. Through the dialect of his people he is able to generalize their feelings about life, their fate, the social situation in which they live and suffer and are oppressed. Here is a demonstration -- which many writers might study -- of the possibilities of the vernacular"[2]. Hurston wasn't so excited about Wright's dialogue, criticizing Wright's use of dialect: "Since the author is himself a Negro, his dialect is a puzzling thing. One wonders how he arrived at it. Certainly he does not write by ear unless he is tone-deaf"[3]. "Big Boy Leaves Home" presents a child whose innocence is lost violently through a confrontation with the son of a white landowner. While Big Boy is aware of the racist society in which he lives, his reactions are more instinctive than reflective. In "Down by the Riverside," the protagonist Mann finds himself drawn into confrontations with the white community through circumstances beyond his control: first the flood, then the need to transport his wife, who is in labor, towards town in a boat stolen from a white man. Mann's responses to these circumstances suggest his resignation to fate, although he does consider and reject alternatives that would possibly save him. With "Long Black Song," the characters begin to identify the systemic nature of racist oppression. Silas, who owns his own land but whose wife Sarah has been unfaithful with a white travelling salesman, confronts and kills the salesman, then calmly awaits the white mob. As Sarah looks on, Silas announces, "The white folks ain never gimme a chance! They ain never give no black man a chance! There ain nothin in yo whole life yuh kin keep from em! They take yo lan! They take yo freedom! They take yo women! N then they take yo life!" [4]. In "Fire and Cloud" and "Bright and Morning Star," Wright turns to an examination of the economic uses of racism, particularly the way in which skin color divides the working class and reinforces the capitalist power structure. In "Fire and Cloud," Reverend Taylor's realization that his leadership position in the Black community doesn't shield him from racist violence and in fact depends a good deal on his leading his people toward decisions that benefit the status quo leads him to reject the mayor's demand that he tell his hungry congregation not to participate in a communist led march. He tells his congregation, "All the time they wuz hepin me, all the time they been givin me favors, they wuz doin it sos they could tell me t tell yuh how t ack!" [5] Taylor sides with the communists' cause, although he doesn't identify with the communists themselves. As his revelation comes to him, Taylor exclaims to his son, "Gawds wid the people! N the peoples gotta be real as Gawd t us! We cant hep ourselves er the people when wes erlone...All the will, all the strength, all the power, all the numbahs is in the people!" [6]. In "Bright and Morning Star," Wright continues an examination of the competing roles of religion and communism in his characters and their community. Johnny-Boy's mother Sue must come to grips with a new vision: "The wrongs and sufferings of black men had taken the place of Him nailed to the Cross; the meager beginnings of the party had become another resurrection" [7]. As in the other stories, Sue is finally forced to act through the physical violence visited upon her by the white community. In shooting the stoolpigeon Booker, Sue knows she has given up her own life. Her final sacrifice is not only a defense of her son, but also a defense of the Communist Party, for whom Johnny-Boy works as an organizer. Wright's treatment of communism in the African American community in these stories is hardly simplistic. Taylor's understanding that his people's interests and the communists' goals are in tandem arises through his experiences in the food crisis. However, the text also allows Taylor to remain ambiguously independent of the Communist Party. Likewise in "Bright and Morning Star," the racial solidarity suggested or promised by communism is shown to be easily undermined through infiltration. In other words, although Johnny-Boy rejects the racial paradigm in favor of an economic analysis ("Ah cant see white n Ah cant see black...Ah sees rich men n Ah sees po men" [8].), he still must function in a community that hasn't thoroughly rejected it. For articles relating to Uncle Tom's Children, visit this page. [1] Appiah, K.A., and Henry
Louis Gates, Jr., eds. Richard Wright:
Critical Perspectives Past and Present (New York: Amistad,
1993), 3. |