The Black Experience in America Theme Analysis

“Usually when people say that, they have good intentions, they think they’re giving you a compliment, but when you look at it…”

Jimmie said, “It’s an insult.”

“I can’t deny that, Jimmie,” Mother said, “but you learn you have to make allowances. You have to know which battles are worth fighting.”

Father said, “And ‘credit to your race’ and a lot of other sayings you’ll be running into are things that give you a warning about whoever it is who’s saying them. […] Think about a strange dog, Deza. They let you know if they’re friendly or not, right? […] Unless they’re rabid they give you signals that if you get any closer you’ll end up hurt. […] Think of ‘credit to your race’ as that first growl. Just be aware that that person is letting you know you need to keep an even sharper-than-normal eye on them.

Father said, “That’s what we’re hoping for, Jimmie. Joe knows he’s got to win this fight, he knows how important it is, he’ll come through.

“Some of the time life boils down to some pretty ridiculous things, Deza. This is one of them. I agree, it’s silly to put so much importance on one fight, but you have to keep in mind that this fight is the one chance we have to show the Nazis, we are people too. It’s ironic, but Joe will show we’re human by savagely beating the stuffing out of someone.”

I would have believed anything my father was saying because it was in his own strong voice. I was going to have faith in Father’s word. I was going to try to make a light come on for Clarice, because the more I thought about it the madder I got at myself for not seeing this on my own.

Father’s lisp was back. “I can’t believe it, Peg. It’th like that fog on the lake, I never thought I’d thee or eel anything like it again, but here it ith. Thith ith jutht ath heavy on my heart. Thith ith the thame feeling. Oh, God, Peg, won’t I ever get rid of thith? Ith thomething wrong with me?”

Mother wrapped an arm around Father’s shoulder.

Clarice was squeezing my left hand and Jimmie was squeezing my right as we walked.

Father said, “What ith going—”

I looked back and Mother shushed Father. “Wait till we get home, it will be OK.”

“Why are you taking this so personal? You have nothing to be ashamed of, Roscoe. No one has work, no one has food.”

Father said, “Maybe you’re right, maybe it’s not shame. Maybe it’s fear. Maybe I’m afraid that one day I’ll come in here and see the love and concern on all of your faces, see the way you and the kids work so hard to make me feel better, and I’ll lose my mind. I’ll be so hurt, so angry, so desperate that I’ll go out in the streets and do something horrible. Something to get food or coal or clothes, something that would allow me to feed my family, something that would allow me to feel like a human being and not some animal in a zoo waiting for a handout.”

“But it wasn’t me singing, it was my brother, my big brother!” I don’t think a prouder sentence has ever crossed my lips. […] “We tell him all the time that thee isn’t anyone else in the world with a voice so beautiful.”

The harmonica man said to him, “I played all over this country and I ain’t never heard nothing like that in my life. […] My name’s Zeke Greene, folks call me Saw-Bone Zee and it’s a true honor to make the acquaintance of a brother musician like you, sir.”

Sir!

It’s horrible what one tiny word can do to you. […] I’d learned not to cry or even get angry when all sorts of calamity befell us. […] I thought I could control it all.

And then this man called Jimmie “sir” and all my hardness melted away.

I’d decided in Gary that when it came to reading those kinds of words, I had four choices: one, I could pretend that I had blond hair and blue eyes. But that didn’t feel right. Two, I could start reading novels like they were history books, just a bunch of facts put together. But that wasn’t what the authors wanted, they wanted me to enjoy the story the way they wrote it. Three, I could change a word or two here or there and keep enjoying them by pretending they were about me, or four, I could stop reading novels altogether.

[…]

I’d decided a long time ago that I’d ignore those interrupting words and keep reading.

I look at my novels the same way Mother looks at buggy oatmeal: there might be a few bad things in them, but if you plugged your nose and sifted them out, there was still something pretty good left.