Wealth In Ann Petry's The Street

225 Words1 Pages
Lutie Johnson, the protagonist in Ann Petry’s novel The Street, is a black women who is influenced by the allure of wealth. Her fascination with money begins as she is forced to find work to support her family. She gets a job as a maid in a wealthy, white residence where she is instilled with the idea that wealth can be attainable by anyone. Lutie fails to realize that wealth is the inseparable wall between the lives of white and black people during the 1940’s. “After listening to their talk, she absorbed some of the same spirit. The belief that anybody could be rich if he wanted to and worked hard enough and figured it out carefully enough. Apparently that’s what the Pizzinis had done. She and Jim could do the same thing” (Petry 43). Lutie