Notes Of A Native Son: The Hero's Mythic Journey

“Notes of a Native Son” is an autobiographical writing written by American contemporary black writer James Baldwin. At the first time I read “ Notes of Native Son”, the title catch my attention. In my opinion, “Son” only means male child. But Baldwin describes something more meaningful in his essay. In Baldwin’s mind, African Americans should be free and equal native son of American just like the white. He uses the word “son” to reflect to his family, his father and the whole society. In Notes of a Native Son, James Baldwin adheres the parameters and goals of The Hero’s Mythic Journey, which was written by Joseph Campbell. According to Campbell ‘s ideas, there are twelve stages of the hero journey, which can also be divided into three parts—ordinary world, special world and retuning to ordinary world. Same to the hero journey, death and birth were described as a circle in Baldwin’s essay because he wants to adhere the …show more content…
In Baldwin’s essay, the race riot highlights the stubborn racial discrimination that remains in American. He describes the riot as “ The most sustained and brutally dissonant of codas”. Baldwin is antipathetic to racism. Without racism, nothing would happen during his father’s funeral. Also, Baldwin’s father maybe a completely different person and apocalyptic prophesies of his father may not be come true. Race riot reflects the social condition of that time. Father’s death gives Baldwin a chance to meditate the relationship between the race riot and apocalyptic prophesies of his father and the aftermath of the race riot. Baldwin believes that suffering the racism from the society is the main reason, which causes his father be eaten up by paranoia. He wants to show the readers that his father’s death and the race riot are both directly caused by the