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From the beginning, Bigger was doomed. He was a "nigger" on Chicago's South Side, surrounded by rats and rebels with nowhere to go, a "nigger" in a white man's world. He might have been up for some petty crime, but by chance it was for murder and rape.
He killed the first girl in an unpremeditated moment of panic and was caught up by forces he could neither understand nor control. Murder led to a more brutal murder and Bigger at last felt alive—he had found in acts of violence the sense of manhood and freedom, (distorted as they were, which Bessie, with her whiskey, and his mother, with her religion, had not been able to give him.
This classic novel is one of powerful emotions and naked suffering. It is an assault upon the white man and his society, in which Wright's rage and bitter- ness are compressed to a degree that forces us to experience the truth of what man does to man.
--jacket
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Previews available in: English French
Subjects
African American men, African americans, American fiction (fictional works by one author), Bildungsromans, Blacks, classic literature, Communism, Crime, Crime fiction, Criminals, Death row inmates, Drama, fiction, Long Now Manual for Civilization, Murder, Murderers, open_syllabus_project, psychological fiction, Reading Level-Grade 6, Reading Level-Grade 7, Reading Level-Grade 8, Reading Level-Grade 9, Reading Level-Grade 10, Reading Level-Grade 11, Reading Level-Grade 12, Trials (Murder), African americans, fiction, Thomas, bigger (fictitious character), fiction, Chicago (ill.), fiction, Illinois, fiction, Bigger Thomas (Fictitious character), African American men in literature, Trials (Murder) in literature, Murder in literature, American literature, History and criticism, Fiction, psychological, Crime, fiction, Criminals, fiction, Wright, richard, 1908-1960, Fiction, general, Literary collections, Thomas, bigger (fictitious character)People
Bigger Thomas, Vera Thomas, Mrs. Thomas, Henry Dalton, Gus, G.H., Jack Harding, Mary Dalton, Mrs. Dalton, Peggy, Jan Erlone, Bessie, Mr. Britten, Boris Max, Buddy Thomas, BuckleyTimes
1930sShowing 11 featured editions. View all 75 editions?
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Native Son: and How Bigger Was Born
1994, HarperPerennial
Paperback
in English
- 1st HarperPerennial edition (5)
0060812494 9780060812492
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Native Son
1989, Perennial Library
Mass Market Paperback
in English
- 1st Perennial Library edition, reissued (1)
0060809779 9780060809775
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Un enfant du pays
January 14, 1988, Gallimard, Gallimard Education
Mass Market Paperback
in French
2070378551 9782070378555
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06
Native Son
1970?, Harper & Row
Mass Market Paperback
in English
- printing (27)
0060830557 9780060830557
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Book Details
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Work Description
Native Son (1940) is a novel written by the American author Richard Wright. It tells the story of 20-year-old Bigger Thomas, a black youth living in utter poverty in a poor area on Chicago's South Side in the 1930s.
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- Created April 1, 2008
- 14 revisions
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December 10, 2023 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
January 9, 2023 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
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December 8, 2022 | Edited by ImportBot | import existing book |
April 1, 2008 | Created by an anonymous user | Imported from Scriblio MARC record |