Black Boy Rhetorical Analysis

Dannica Doplayna, Period 3
Ms. Reid, English 10 / 10 Honors
13 December 2015
ORP 2 Dialectical Journal / Theme Statement Paragraph

Wright, Richard. Black Boy. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1944. Print.

Passages quoted from the text
Responses
1. “He could not punish me now without risking his authority. I was happy because I had at last found a way to throw my criticism of him into his face” (13).
Wright’s actions towards the kitten may have been violent, but they felt justified. Wright was brought up in the type of environment that majority of people cannot relate to, and the sense of feeling stronger towards someone who is more powerful than you is unlike any other emotion. It was Wright’s first time doing such a thing, and it was something that he could be proud of. I can’t judge something like that. …show more content…
“I wanted to rush back to the safety of the black faces I knew” (81).
This sentence was more dark than I had expected, as well as sad. It was painful to read, and to remember how impactful racism is.
10. “Though I was a child, I could no longer feel as a child, could no longer react as a child. The desire for play was gone and I brooded, wondering if Granny would come and help us” (100).
Earlier in the book, Wright showed signs of a “regular” child who played and laughed. It was shocking but also sensical as soon as his mother was on the verge of death that he stopped being himself.
11. “Her life set the emotional tone of my life, ...determined my attitude to situations and circumstances I had yet to face” (117).
This was the part of the book that helped me realize that Wright’s mother is the one that made him, him. She is his mother, who raised him to be independent, but had also broken his trust in other people. I couldn’t agree more that her teachings will always influence Wright.
12. “Now I was truly dead to Granny and Aunt Addie, but my mother smiled when I told her I had defied them. She rose and hobbled to me on her paralytic legs and kissed me”

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