Black Boy Symbolism, Imagery & Allegory

Hungry Like a WolfWe don’t know if you noticed, but Richard is hungry. You probably did, since Wright tells us almost a hundred times, but it’s cool if you didn’t. So, since Wright is a smart...

Valhalla. The Elysian Fields. Spring Break in Key West. Every culture has a place where everything is awesome, and everyone is eternally happy. (In some of those cultures, unfortunately, you have t...

There is an awful lot of silence in Black Boy. Since books are basically the opposite of silence—they’re all about words—it’s notable that Black Boy brings up "silent" and "silence" almost...

When Richard is a little boy, his mother suddenly gets sick. She never really gets better, and a lot of the time she actually gets worse. We don’t know why she gets sick, and no one ever seems to...