The novel, Native Son by Richard Wright, takes place in 1930s Chicago. During this time, segregation is in undeniable existence. One of the effects of segregation can be seen as the protagonist, Bigger, and the rest of the African-Americans are alienated from society. Bigger feels restricted by the white race and feels as if he does not belong. This is established when Bigger mentions wanting to fly a plane and his conversation with Boris Max, his defense attorney.
In Book Two, titled Flight, Bigger is walking to the pool hall, but stops to talk one of the members of his gang. This is Gus, one of the ‘weaker links’. They stand on the sidewalk, but a skywriter captures their attention. In this moment, Bigger indicates that he wants to be a pilot. However, he comes
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He feels like they are not considered people to them and that they are just ignored. He describes his feeling as “[him being] on the outside of the world peeping through a knothole in a fence” (Wright 20). Richard Wright uses this analogy to emphasize the alienation apparent in society. The whites use skin color as an excuse to omit others who should be allowed to share the same space as them.
In Book One, Fear, Bigger lands a job with The Dalton’s, who is a very rich, white family. His job is to basically do whatever they tell him to do, go wherever they tell him to go, etc. One day he is supposed to take Mary Dalton, Henry Dalton and Mrs. Dalton’s daughter, to a lecture at the university, but as the time approaches, she insists that is not the plan. They meet up with her communist boyfriend, Jan, and they spend the day participating in activities Mary does not want her parents knowing about. That night, when Bigger brings Mary back home she is very drunk. He takes her up to her room and leaves the car parked outside. While in her room Bigger is taken over by his teenage boy hormones and decides to pursue Mary while she is drunk. In the midst of this happening, Mary’s mother comes in the room but, to