Black Boy Chapter Summaries

The novel “Black Boy” was interesting, intriguing, disgusting, and upsetting all at the same time. There were various intense scenes in this novel that are guaranteed to catch a reader's attention, make the reader cringe, or maybe even make the reader cry. It represented the cruelty and discrimination that the Negroes had gone through in the 1940’s. “Black Boy” educated readers about how harshly white people treated Negroes. The most interesting chapter was chapter one. Many interesting things happened while reading just the first few pages. It was very interesting that when Richard was bored, he decided to take the bristles on a broom, hold them over the fire, and light the curtains on fire. He became very distraught by his action and

The kid that Richard was sitting in front of had put walnuts on the floor and his Aunt Addie, who was also his religious school teacher, made an assumption that it was Richard. She became furious and began to yell at him. The argument became extremely heated and his Aunt Addie began to whip his hands and beat him. He was not happy that he was taking the blame for something he had not done. He was considering ratting out the kid in front of him but that would have been against his street code. Instead of ratting out, Richard showed his aunt that he is a tough guy by not letting it show that he was being hurt by the lashes. “When she finished I continued to hold out my hand, indicating to her that her blows could never really reach me” (Wright 106). Richard claimed he didn’t want to be violent with his aunt but his next actions completely contradicted what he said. He went as far as to pull a knife on his Aunt

She was minding her own business when the white man and his son dragged her into their store. They beat her and kicked her until she was bleeding and couldn't stand up straight. Other white people passed and watched as if it was a normal thing. Even the police officer just stood there and did not do anything about the horrible situation. “Boy that's what we do to niggers when they don’t pay their bills” (Wright 180).
The most upsetting scene in this novel was when Richard's mother had gotten sick. She was paralyzed, she could not talk and she had to be fed. Richard began to feel what being without her would feel like. “A slowly rising dread stole into me and I would look at my mother for long moments” (Wright 84). As she became sicker and sicker, Richard became morose. He couldn’t “be a child” anymore because he had to take care of his mother.
This book informed readers that race in America in the 1940’s was the biggest problem there was. It taught how cruel and derogatory white people can be to Negroes. They could just breathe the wrong way and the whites would harass them. Racism is still a work in progress but it has improved a great