“That’s the problem,” he said soberly. “The work’s heavy and dangerous.” He was silent and I knew that he considered the matter closed. That was the way things were between whites and blacks in the South; many of the most important things were never openly said; they were understated and left to seep through to one. I, in turn, said nothing; but I did not leave the room; my standing silent was a way of asking him to reconsider, telling him that I wanted ever so much to try for a job in his mill. “All right,” he said finally. “Come to the mill in the morning. I’ll see what I can do. But I don’t think that you’ll like it.”
I was at the mill at dawn the next morning and saw men lifting huge logs with tackle blocks. There were scores of buzzing steel saws biting into green wood with loud whines.
“Watch out!” somebody yelled.
I looked around and saw a black man pointing above my head; I glanced up. A log was swinging toward me. I scrambled out of its path. The black man came to my side.
“What do you want here, boy?”
“Mr. Bibbs, the foreman, told me to look around. I’m looking for a job,” I said.
The man gazed at me intently.
“I wouldn’t try for this if I was you,” he said. “If you know this game, all right. But this is dangerous stuff for a guy that’s green.” He held up his right hand from which three fingers were missing. “See?”
I nodded and left.
Empty days. Long days. Bright hot days. The sun heated the pavements until they felt like the top of an oven. I spent the mornings hunting for jobs and I read during the afternoons. One morning I was walking toward the center of town and passed the home of a classmate, Ned Greenley. He was sitting on his porch, looking glum.
“Hello, Ned. What’s new?” I asked.
“You’ve heard, haven’t you?” he asked.
“About what?”
“My brother, Bob?”
“No, what happened?”
Ned began to weep softly.
“They killed him,” he managed to say.
“The white folks?” I asked in a whisper, guessing.
He sobbed his answer. Bob was dead; I had met him only a few times, but I felt that I had known him through his brother.
“What happened?”
“Th-they t-took him in a c-car…Out on a c-country road…Th-they shot h-him,” Ned whimpered.
I had heard that Bob was working at one of the hotels in town.
“Why?”
“Th-they said he was fooling with a white prostitute there in the hotel,” Ned said.
Inside of me my world crashed and my body felt heavy. I stood looking down the quiet, sun-filled street. Bob had been caught by the white death, the threat of which hung over every male black in the South. I had heard whispered tales of black boys having sex relations with white prostitutes in the hotels in town, but I had never paid any close attention to them; now those tales came home to me in the form of the death of a man I knew.
I did not search for a job that day; I returned home and sat on my porch too, and stared. What I had heard altered the look of the world, induced in me a temporary paralysis of will and impulse. The penalty of death awaited me if I made a false move and I wondered if it was worth-while to make any move at all. The things that influenced my conduct as a Negro did not have to happen to me directly; I needed but to hear of them to feel their full effects in the deepest layers of my consciousness. Indeed, the white brutality that I had not seen was a more effective control of my behavior than that which I knew. The actual experience would have let me see the realistic outlines of what was really happening, but as long as it remained something terrible and yet remote, something whose horror and blood might descend upon me at any moment, I was compelled to give my entire imagination over to it, an act which blocked the springs of thought and feeling in me, creating a sense of distance between me and the world in which I lived.
A few days later I sought out the editor of the local Negro newspaper and found that he could not hire me. I had doubts now about my being able to enter school that fall. The empty days of summer rolled on. Whenever I met my classmates they would tell me about the jobs they had found, how some of them had left town to work in summer resorts in the North. Why did they not tell me of these jobs? I demanded of them. They said that they simply had not thought of it, and as I heard the words fall from their lips my sense of isolation became doubly acute. But, after all, what would make them think of me in connection with jobs when for years I had encountered them only casually in the classroom? I had had no association with them; the religious home in which I lived, my mush-and-lard-gravy poverty had cut me off from the normal processes of the lives of black boys my own age.
One afternoon I made a discovery in the home that stunned me. I was talking to my cousin, Maggie, who was a few months younger than I, when Uncle Tom entered the room. He paused, stared at me with silent hostility, then called his daughter. I gave the matter no thought. A few moments later I rose from my chair, where I had been reading, and was on my way down the hall when I heard Uncle Tom scolding his daughter. I caught a few phrases:
“Do you want me to break your neck? Didn’t I tell you to stay away from him? That boy’s a dangerous fool, I tell you! Then why don’t you keep away from him? And make the other children keep away from him! Ask me no questions, but do as I tell you! Keep away from him, or I’ll skin you!”
And I could hear my cousin’s whimpering replies. My throat grew tight with anger. I wanted to rush into the room and demand an explanation, but I held still. How long had this been going on? I thought back over the time since Uncle Tom and his family had moved into the house, and I was filled with dismay as I recalled that on scarcely any occasion had any of his children ever been alone with me. Be careful now, I told myself; don’t see what isn’t there…But no matter how carefully I weighed my memories, I could recall no innocent intimacy, no games, no playing, none of the association that usually exists between young people living in the same house. Then suddenly I was reliving that early morning when I had held Uncle Tom at bay with my razors. Though I must have seemed brutal and desperate to him, I had never thought of myself as being so, and now I was appalled at how I was regarded. It was a flash of insight which revealed to me the true nature of my relations with my family, an insight which altered the entire course of my life. I was now definitely decided upon leaving home. But I would remain until the ninth grade term had ended. There were many days when I spoke to no one in the home except my mother. My life was falling to pieces and I was acutely aware of it. I was poised for flight, but I was waiting for some event, some word, some act, some circumstance to furnish the impetus.
I returned to my job at Mrs. Bibbs’s and bought my schoolbooks; my clothing remained little better than rags. Luckily the studies in the ninth—my last year at school—were light; and, during a part of the term the teacher turned over the class to my supervision, an honor that helped me emotionally and made me hope faintly. It was even hinted that, if I kept my grades high, it would be possible for me to teach in the city school system.
During that winter my brother came home from Chicago; I was glad to see him, though we were strangers. But it was not long before I felt that the affection shown him by the family was far greater than that which I had ever had from them. Slowly my brother grew openly critical of me, taking his cue from those about him, and it hurt. My loneliness became organic. I felt walled in and I grew irritable. I associated less and less with my classmates, for their talk was now full of the schools they planned to attend when the term was over. The cold days dragged mechanically: up early and to my job, splitting wood, carrying coal, sweeping floors, then off to school and boredom.
The school term ended. I was selected as valedictorian of my class and assigned to write a paper to be delivered at one of the public auditoriums. One morning the principal summoned me to his office.
“Well, Richard Wright, here’s your speech,” he said with smooth bluntness a
nd shoved a stack of stapled sheets across his desk.
“What speech?” I asked as I picked up the papers.
“The speech you’re to say the night of graduation,” he said.
“But, professor, I’ve written my speech already,” I said.
He laughed confidently, indulgently.
“Listen, boy, you’re going to speak to both white and colored people that night. What can you alone think of saying to them? You have no experience…”
I burned.
“I know that I’m not educated, professor,” I said. “But the people are coming to hear the students, and I won’t make a speech that you’ve written.”
He leaned back in his chair and looked at me in surprise.
“You know, we’ve never had a boy in this school like you before,” he said. “You’ve had your way around here. Just how you managed to do it, I don’t know. But, listen, take this speech and say it. I know what’s best for you. You can’t afford to just say anything before those white people that night.” He paused and added meaningfully: “The superintendent of schools will be there; you’re in a position to make a good impression on him. I’ve been a principal for more years than you are old, boy. I’ve seen many a boy and girl graduate from this school, and none of them was too proud to recite a speech I wrote for them.”
I had to make up my mind quickly; I was faced with a matter of principle. I wanted to graduate, but I did not want to make a public speech that was not my own.
“Professor, I’m going to say my own speech that night,” I said.
He grew angry.
“You’re just a young, hotheaded fool,” he said. He toyed with a pencil and looked up at me. “Suppose you don’t graduate?”
“But I passed my examinations,” I said.
“Look, mister,” he shot at me, “I’m the man who says who passes at this school.”
I was so astonished that my body jerked. I had gone to this school for two years and I had never suspected what kind of man the principal was; it simply had never occurred to me to wonder about him.
“Then I don’t graduate,” I said flatly.
I turned to leave.
“Say, you. Come here,” he called.
I turned and faced him; he was smiling at me in a remote, superior sort of way.
“You know, I’m glad I talked to you,” he said. “I was seriously thinking of placing you in the school system, teaching. But, now, I don’t think that you’ll fit.”
He was tempting me, baiting me; this was the technique that snared black young minds into supporting the southern way of life.
“Look, professor, I may never get a chance to go to school again,” I said. “But I like to do things right.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve no money. I’m going to work. Now, this ninth-grade diploma isn’t going to help me much in life. I’m not bitter about it; it’s not your fault. But I’m just not going to do things this way.”
“Have you talked to anybody about this?” he asked me.
“No, why?”
“Are you sure?”
“This is the first I’ve heard of it, professor,” I said, amazed again.
“You haven’t talked to any white people about this?”
“No, sir!”
“I just wanted to know,” he said.
My amazement increased; the man was afraid now for his job!
“Professor, you don’t understand me.” I smiled.
“You’re just a young, hot fool,” he said, confident again. “Wake up, boy. Learn the world you’re living in. You’re smart and I know what you’re after. I’ve kept closer track of you than you think. I know your relatives. Now, if you play safe,” he smiled and winked, “I’ll help you to go to school, to college.”
“I want to learn, professor,” I told him. “But there are some things I don’t want to know.”
“Good-bye,” he said.
I went home, hurt but determined. I had been talking to a “bought” man and he had tried to “buy” me. I felt that I had been dealing with something unclean. That night Griggs, a boy who had gone through many classes with me, came to the house.
“Look, Dick, you’re throwing away your future here in Jackson,” he said. “Go to the principal, talk to him, take his speech and say it. I’m saying the one he wrote. So why can’t you? What the hell? What can you lose?”
“No,” I said.
“Why?”
“I know only a hell of a little, but my speech is going to reflect that,” I said.
“Then you’re going to be blacklisted for teaching jobs,” he said.
“Who the hell said I was going to teach?” I asked.
“God, but you’ve got a will,” he said.
“It’s not will. I just don’t want to do things that way,” I said.
He left. Two days later Uncle Tom came to me. I knew that the principal had called him in.
“I hear that the principal wants you to say a speech which you’ve rejected,” he said.
“Yes, sir. That’s right,” I said.
“May I read the speech you’ve written?” he asked.
“Certainly,” I said, giving him my manuscript.
“And may I see the one that the principal wrote?”
I gave him the principal’s speech too. He went to his room and read them. I sat quiet, waiting. He returned.
“The principal’s speech is the better speech,” he said.
“I don’t doubt it,” I replied. “But why did they ask me to write a speech if I can’t deliver it?”
“Would you let me work on your speech?” he asked.
“No, sir.”
“Now, look, Richard, this is your future…”
“Uncle Tom, I don’t care to discuss this with you,” I said.
He stared at me, then left. The principal’s speech was simpler and clearer than mine, but it did not say anything; mine was cloudy, but it said what I wanted to say. What could I do? I had half a mind not to show up at the graduation exercises. I was hating my environment more each day. As soon as school was over, I would get a job, save money, and leave.
Griggs, who had accepted a speech written by the principal, came to my house each day and we went off into the woods to practice orating; day in and day out we spoke to the trees, to the creeks, frightening the birds, making the cows in the pastures stare at us in fear. I memorized my speech so thoroughly that I could have recited it in my sleep.
The news of my clash with the principal had spread through the class and the students became openly critical of me.
“Richard, you’re a fool. You’re throwing away every chance you’ve got. If they had known the kind of fool boy you are, they would never have made you valedictorian,” they said.
I gritted my teeth and kept my mouth shut, but my rage was mounting by the hour. My classmates, motivated by a desire to “save” me, pestered me until I all but reached the breaking point. In the end the principal had to caution them to let me alone, for fear I would throw up the sponge and walk out.
I had one more problem to settle before I could make my speech. I was the only boy in my class wearing short pants and I was grimly determined to leave school in long pants. Was I not going to work? Would I not be on my own? When my desire for long pants became known at home, yet another storm shook the house.
“You’re trying to go too fast,” my mother said.
“You’re nothing but a child,” Uncle Tom pronounced.
“He’s beside himself,” Granny said.
I served notice that I was making my own decisions from then on. I borrowed money from Mrs. Bibbs, my employer, made a down payment on a pearl-gray suit. If I could not pay for it, I would take the damn thing back after graduation.
On the night of graduation I was nervous and tense; I rose and faced the audience and my speech rolled out. When my voice stopped there was some applause. I did not care if they liked it or not; I was through. Immediately, even before I le
ft the platform, I tried to shunt all memory of the event from me. A few of my classmates managed to shake my hand as I pushed toward the door, seeking the street. Somebody invited me to a party and I did not accept. I did not want to see any of them again. I walked home, saying to myself: The hell with it! With almost seventeen years of baffled living behind me, I faced the world in 1925.
9
My life now depended upon my finding work, and I was so anxious that I accepted the first offer, a job as a porter in a clothing store selling cheap goods to Negroes on credit. The shop was always crowded with black men and women pawing over cheap suits and dresses. And they paid whatever price the white man asked. The boss, his son, and the clerk treated the Negroes with open contempt, pushing, kicking, or slapping them. No matter how often I witnessed it, I could not get used to it. How can they accept it? I asked myself. I kept on edge, trying to stifle my feelings and never quite succeeding, a prey to guilt and fear because I felt that the boss suspected that I resented what I saw.
One morning, while I was polishing brass out front, the boss and his son drove up in their car. A frightened black woman sat between them. They got out and half dragged and half kicked the woman into the store. White people passed and looked on without expression. A white policeman watched from the corner, twirling his night stick; but he made no move. I watched out of the corner of my eyes, but I never slackened the strokes of my chamois upon the brass. After a moment or two I heard shrill screams coming from the rear room of the store; later the woman stumbled out, bleeding, crying, holding her stomach, her clothing torn. When she reached the sidewalk, the policeman met her, grabbed her, accused her of being drunk, called a patrol wagon and carted her away.
When I went to the rear of the store, the boss and his son were washing their hands at the sink. They looked at me and laughed uneasily. The floor was bloody, strewn with wisps of hair and clothing. My face must have reflected my shock, for the boss slapped me reassuringly on the back.
“Boy, that’s what we do to niggers when they don’t pay their bills,” he said.
His son looked at me and grinned.
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