Childhood In Richard Wright's Black Boy

Black boy is a memoir written by Richard Wright describing his childhood all the way to his adult life. He begins his memoir with his earliest memory of setting his grandmother 's house on fire with a broomstick. Shortly after they move to Memphis,Tennessee to a new house. Richard’s father leaves them for another woman and after that Richard and his brother only see their father a couple of times. After their father leaves Richard’s mother is forced to work to provide for them. While his mother is at work, Richard and his brother Leon are left by themselves. When Richard is six he wanders into a saloon and becomes drunk. He likes the feeling so much that he goes back everyday, immediately after his mother leaves for work. He continues to …show more content…
One day while Ella is reading to Richard his grandmother catches them and beats Richard for reading “Devil Stuff”. She also kicks Ella out of the house. On the way to Elaine, Richard get his first taste of Segregation. On the train ride to Elaine Richard’s grandmother gets on the “whites only” train and he gets on the “blacks only” train. He asks his mother a slew of questions, but she never fully answers Richard’s question of “Why is grandmother on the whites train if she is black?” During their tenure in Elaine Richard eats as much as he wants for the first time. Uncle Hoskins is viciously murdered by white men because of his saloon and as a result, Aunt Addie and Richard’s family has to flee for their safety. While in West Helena, Richard sees a prostitute and a man in the apartment next door. The landlord catches Richard and tells his mother and Aunt Addie that they have to move out for messing with her “business”. They move yet again and Aunt Addie finds another love interest with a man named Professor Matthew, who only visits her at night. After he kills a white woman he convinces Addie to move up north with him. Richard tries to make some easy money, so he decides to sell his poodle