2024 Right On

I remember reading a yellow hardcover version of Native Son by Richard Wright, under lamplight, in a house full of black cats, really late at night. That book, borrowed from the university library, looked as if it had been printed in the seventies. I was actually supposed to be reading Don DeLillo's Libra, for a course in American Literature. I was so into Native Son though; I was reading it out of interest, that I put off reading DeLillo and actually almost failed the assessment component a couple of days later because I had to stay up all night, 2024 the following night, reading DeLillo prior to the exam.

Back in those days, I was working on a dreadful novel in which the main character drowned, ostensibly. I actually had a dream as that character from which I awoke as I was sinking, breathlessly, into a pool. I'd gasped as my knees had folded beneath me, at the bottom, upon realising that the last of my air was exhaled; I was watching the series of bubbles drifting up, from my mouth, to the surface. As you might imagine, I awoke with a start. I'd fallen asleep having been up all night and walked to the university at dawn, to print a manuscript for editing. Upon returning home, at about seven that morning, I'd made the mistake of sitting on the bed. It was all very Bright Eyes; I'm Wide Awake It's Morning or like Bob Dylan's sombre One Too Many Mornings. Those were the weird old days, lost in a labyrinth of literature, in my head, without much hope of ever amounting to anything. These days are even weirder.

While I certainly recommend Native Son, I'm aware that Baldwin criticised the perpetuation of Bigger Thomas as a stereotype. Likewise, I'm aware that Fanon had a differing point of view. Perhaps my isolation as a continental Australian, as well as my affinity for Malcolm X, engenders my siding with Fanon. In any case, Bigger Thomas is a most compelling character. To have come up with such a construct and novel despite the hardships of the 1930s and other, more obvious setbacks, is highly admirable. Richard Wright, for mine, is equally as powerful a writer as Baldwin although I'd never discount Baldwin's perspective; not without hesitation. Perhaps Richard Wright just had to work harder for it and that's what I'm identifying with, the son of a gun; legend.

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