Native Son

Wright often uses symbolism and characterization to reinforce his theme of racism and oppression. The alarm clock that rings in the beginning of the novel is symbolic. It is a symbol Wright uses as a ôwake upö call to a society that remains locked in illusions regarding its creation of unequal race relations. Such treatment of African Americans makes Bigger an individual who is ôfollowing a strange path in a strange landö (Wright 127). This is why BiggerÆs lawyer tells the court that Bigger is incapable of killing, because he is already dead as he is forced to exist in a society that refuses him any affirmation of life.

Bigger is a displaced persona because the society into which he is born allows him no place. He is destined to fail, primari

. . .
in some detail. (In this regard, the projection of white supervision onto the cat is the flip side, so to speak, of the projection of a certain black self-policing onto the black rat from the novel's opening.) But to say that Bigger's vision, or narrative if you will, is not paranoid does not mean that this projection, though emotionally or psychologically powerful, helps him understand how the system works. Quite the contrary, it makes such an understanding impossible. In short, while the virtual blizzard of whiteness is a powerful metaphor for a system of supervision and control and its effect on the black subject, what is required is the examination and understanding of that system through some scientific method, say dialectical materialism, not simply a representation of that system. Again, it should be noted that such mystification and misunderstanding are not restricted to Bigger. They are characteristic of virtually everyone the reader encounters in Native Son. Once again Wright utilizes a central gothic convention, a terror of incomprehension. This is the terror that the world one inhabits is guided by rules other than those one is able to see, or that within one's world or very close to it are contained secrets--deeds, o
. . .

Some common words found in the essay are:
Native Son, African Americans, African American, GH Jack--from, Jack Bigger, Moreover Butler, Bigger Butler's, Eighteenth Brumaire, Bessie Bigger's, Black Belt, native son, african american, african americans, black male, mass culture,  , black males, bigger's humanity, poor urban, poor urban black, urban black, urban black males, african american literature, black male community,   ,
Approximate Word count = 10529
Approximate Pages = 42 (250 words per page)