Editing Richard Wright (author)

{{Short description|American novelist and poet (1908–1960)}}
{{For|the Canadian author|Richard B. Wright}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=August 2020}}
{{Infobox writer
| name          = Richard Wright
| image         = Richard Wright.jpg
| caption       = Wright in a 1939 photograph by [[Carl Van Vechten]]
| birth_name    = Richard Nathaniel Wright
| birth_date    = {{Birth date|1908|9|4|mf=y}}
| birth_place   = Plantation, [[Roxie, Mississippi]], U.S.
| death_date    = {{Death date and age|1960|11|28|1908|9|4}}
| death_place   = [[Paris]], France
| occupation    = {{flatlist|
* Novelist
* poet
* essayist
* short story writer}}
| notableworks  = ''[[Uncle Tom's Children]]'', ''[[Native Son]]'', ''[[Black Boy]]'', ''[[The Outsider (Richard Wright)|The Outsider]]''
| period        = 1938–60
| genre         = Drama, fiction, non-fiction, autobiography
| spouse        =
{{marriage|Dhimah Rose Meidman|1939|1940|end=div}}
{{marriage|Ellen Poplar|1941}}
| children      = 2
}}
'''Richard Nathaniel Wright''' (September 4, 1908 – November 28, 1960) was an American author of novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction. Much of his literature concerns racial themes, especially related to the plight of [[African Americans]] during the late 19th to mid 20th centuries suffering discrimination and violence. His best known works include the novella collection ''[[Uncle Tom's Children]]'' (1938), the novel ''[[Native Son]]'' (1940), and the memoir ''[[Black Boy]]'' (1945). Literary critics believe his work helped change [[Racism in the United States|race relations in the United States]] in the mid-20th century.

== Early life and education ==
[[File:Richard Wright historical marker, Natchez, MS IMG 6941.JPG|thumb|A historic marker in [[Natchez, Mississippi]], commemorating Wright, who was born near the city]]

===Childhood in the US South===
Richard Nathaniel Wright was born on September 4, 1908, at Rucker's Plantation, between the train town of [[Roxie, Mississippi|Roxie]] and the larger river city of [[Natchez, Mississippi]].<ref name="life" /> He was the son of Nathan Wright, a [[sharecropper]],<ref name=life>{{Cite web|url=http://mississippiencyclopedia.org/entries/richard-wright/|title=Richard Wright|website=Mississippi Encyclopedia|access-date=October 29, 2019}}</ref> and Ella (Wilson),<ref>[https://familysearch.org/search/record/results?count=20&query=%2Bgivenname%3AElla%20%2Bsurname%3AWilson%20%2Bbirth_place%3AMississippi%20%2Bresidence_year%3A1880-1910~%20%2Bfather_surname%3AWilson&offset=20 US Census 1900]</ref> a schoolteacher.<ref name=life/><ref>[https://familysearch.org/search/record/results?count=20&query=%2Bsurname%3AWright%20%2Bfather_givenname%3ARichard%20%2Bfather_surname%3AWilson LDS Family Search: Cook County Death record]</ref> His parents were born free after the [[American Civil War|Civil War]]; both sets of his grandparents had been born into [[slavery]] and freed as a result of the war. Each of his grandfathers had taken part in the U.S. Civil War and gained freedom through service: his paternal grandfather, Nathan Wright, had served in the 28th [[United States Colored Troops]]; his maternal grandfather, Richard Wilson, escaped from slavery in the South to serve in the [[United States Navy|U.S. Navy]] as a [[Landsman (rank)|Landsman]] in April 1865.<ref>[https://civilwartalk.com/threads/richard-wilson-aka-richard-vincent.97026/#post-832592 Summary of Richard Wilson and Nathan Wrights Civil War services] at Civil War Talk Forum. Retrieved May 5,2019.</ref>

Richard's father left the family when Richard was six years old, and he did not see Richard for 25 years. In 1911 or 1912, Ella moved to Natchez, Mississippi, to be with her parents. While living in his grandparents' home, he accidentally set the house on fire. Wright's mother was so angry that she beat him until he was unconscious.<ref name=childhood>{{Cite web|url=https://www.mswritersandmusicians.com/mississippi-writers/richard-wright|title=Richard Wright|website=Mississippi Writers & Musicians|access-date=October 30, 2019}}</ref><ref name=fire>{{Cite web|url=http://blackhistorynow.com/richard-wright/|title=Richard Wright|website=BlackHistoryNow|date=August 7, 2011|access-date=October 30, 2019|archive-date=April 13, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200413105901/http://blackhistorynow.com/richard-wright/|url-status=dead}}</ref> In 1915, Ella put her sons in Settlement House, a [[Methodism|Methodist]] [[orphanage]], for a short time.<ref name=childhood/><ref name=abuse>{{Cite web|url=http://blackboy.pbworks.com/w/page/59555846/Say%20Hello%20To%20Richard%20Wright|title=Say Hello To Richard Wright |publisher=PBworks |website=blackboy |access-date=October 30, 2019}}</ref> He was enrolled at [[Howe Institute (Tennessee)|Howe Institute]] in [[Memphis, Tennessee|Memphis]], Tennessee, from 1915 to 1916.<ref name=life/>  In 1916, his mother moved with Richard and his younger brother to live with her sister Maggie (Wilson) and Maggie's husband Silas Hoskins (born 1882) in [[Elaine, Arkansas]]. This part of Arkansas was in the [[Mississippi Delta]], where former cotton plantations had been. The Wrights were forced to flee after Silas Hoskins "disappeared", reportedly  killed by a white man who coveted his successful saloon business.<ref name=":0">{{cite web|url=http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=3755|title=Richard Nathaniel Wright (1908–1960) |website= Encyclopedia of Arkansas|access-date=September 30, 2016}}</ref> After his mother became incapacitated by a stroke, Richard was separated from his younger brother and lived briefly with his uncle Clark Wilson and aunt Jodie in [[Greenwood, Mississippi|Greenwood]], Mississippi.<ref name=life/> At the age of 12, Richard had not yet had a single complete year of schooling.

Soon Richard with his younger brother and mother returned to the home of his maternal grandmother, which was now in the state capital, [[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]], Mississippi, where he lived from early 1920 until late 1925. His grandparents, still angry at him for destroying their house, repeatedly beat Wright and his brother.<ref name=fire/> But while he lived there, he was finally able to attend school regularly. He attended the local [[Seventh-day Adventist]] school from 1920 to 1921, with his aunt Addie as his teacher.<ref name=life/><ref name=childhood/> After a year, at the age of 13 he entered the Jim Hill public school in 1921, where he was promoted to sixth grade after only two weeks.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Black Boy |last= Wright |year= 1966 |publisher=Harper and Row |location= New York |pages= 135–138 }}</ref>

In his grandparents' Seventh-day Adventist home, Richard was miserable, largely because his controlling aunt and grandmother tried to force him to pray so he might build a relationship with [[God]]. Wright later threatened to move out of his grandmother's home when she would not allow him to work on the [[Sabbath in seventh-day churches|Adventist Sabbath]], Saturday. His aunt's and grandparents' overbearing attempts to control him caused him to carry over hostility towards Biblical and Christian teachings to solve life's problems. This theme would weave through his writings throughout his life.<ref name=abuse/>

At the age of 15, while in eighth grade, Wright published his first story, "The Voodoo of Hell's Half-Acre", in the local Black newspaper ''Southern Register.'' No copies survive.<ref name="abuse" /> In Chapter 7 of ''Black Boy'', he described the story as about a villain who sought a widow's home.<ref>{{Cite book|title= Black Boy |last= Wright |year= 1966 |publisher= Harper and Row |location= New York |pages= 182–186 }}</ref>

In 1923, after excelling in grade school and junior high, Wright earned the position of class [[valedictorian]] of Smith Robertson Junior High School from which he graduated in May 1925.<ref name=life/> He was assigned to write a speech to be delivered at graduation in a public auditorium. Before graduation day, he was called to the principal's office, where the principal gave him a prepared speech to present in place of his own. Richard challenged the principal, saying: "[T]he people are coming to hear the students, and I won't make a speech that you've written."<ref>{{Cite book|title= Black Boy |last= Wright |year= 1966 |publisher=Harper and Row |location= New York |pages= 193–197 }}</ref> The principal threatened him, suggesting that Richard might not be allowed to graduate if he persisted, despite his having passed all the examinations. He also tried to entice Richard with an opportunity to become a teacher. Determined not to be called an [[Uncle Tom]], Richard refused to deliver the principal's address, written to avoid offending the white school district officials. He was able to convince everyone to allow him to read the words he had written himself.<ref name="abuse" />

In September that year, Wright registered for mathematics, English, and history courses at the new [[Lanier High School (Jackson, Mississippi)|Lanier High School]], constructed for black students in Jackson—the state's schools were segregated under its Jim Crow laws—but he had to stop attending classes after a few weeks of irregular attendance because he needed to earn money to support his family.<ref name="abuse" /><ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Wright |first=Richard |url=https://archive.org/details/blackboyrecordof00wrig_0 |title=Black Boy |publisher=[[Harper and Row Publishers]] |year=1966 |isbn=0060830565 |location=New York |url-access=registration}}</ref>

In November 1925, at the age of 17, Wright moved on his own to Memphis, Tennessee. There, he fed his appetite for reading. His hunger for books was so great that Wright devised a successful ploy to borrow books from the segregated white library. Using a library card lent by a white coworker, which he presented with forged notes that claimed he was picking up books for the white man, Wright was able to obtain and read books forbidden to black people in the Jim Crow South. This stratagem also allowed him access to publications such as [[Harper's Magazine|''Harper's'']], the ''[[Atlantic Monthly]]'', and ''[[The American Mercury]]''.<ref name="abuse" />

He planned to have his mother come and live with him once he could support her, and in 1926, his mother and younger brother did rejoin him. Shortly thereafter, Richard resolved to leave the [[Jim Crow economy|Jim Crow South]] and go to Chicago.<ref>{{Cite book|title= Black Boy |last= Wright |year= 1966 |publisher=Harper and Row |location= New York |pages= 276–278}}</ref> His family joined the [[Great Migration (African American)|Great Migration]], when tens of thousands of blacks left the South to seek opportunities in the more economically prosperous northern and mid-western industrial cities.

Wright's childhood in Mississippi, Tennessee, and Arkansas shaped his lasting impressions of American racism.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Black Boy |last=Wright |first=Richard |year=1993 |publisher=[[HarperCollins]] |location=New York |isbn=0060812508 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/blackboyamerican00wrig/page/455 455]–459 |url=https://archive.org/details/blackboyamerican00wrig |url-access=registration }}</ref>

=== Coming of age in Chicago ===

Wright and his family moved to Chicago in 1927, where he secured employment as a [[United States Postal Service|United States postal]] clerk.<ref name=":0" /> He used his time in between shifts to study other writers including [[H. L. Mencken]], whose vision of the American South as a version of Hell made an impression. When he lost his job there during the [[Great Depression]], Wright was forced to go on [[Federal Emergency Relief Administration|relief]] in 1931.<ref name="abuse" /> In 1932, he began attending meetings of the [[John Reed Club]], a [[Marxist]] literary organization.<ref name="abuse" /><ref>{{Cite web|title=Left Front (magazine) – Wikipedia for FEVERv2|url=http://mediawiki.feverous.co.uk/index.php/Left_Front_(magazine)|access-date=2021-04-05|website=mediawiki.feverous.co.uk|archive-date=November 28, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211128000501/http://mediawiki.feverous.co.uk/index.php/Left_Front_(magazine)|url-status=dead}}</ref> Wright established relationships and networked with party members. Wright formally joined the [[Communist Party USA|Communist Party]] and the John Reed Club in late 1933 at the urging of his friend Abraham Aaron.{{citation needed|date=April 2021}} As a revolutionary poet, he wrote proletarian poems ("We of the Red Leaves of Red Books", for example), for ''[[New Masses]]'' and other communist-leaning periodicals.<ref name="abuse" /> A power struggle within the Chicago chapter of the John Reed Club had led to the dissolution of the club's leadership; Wright was told he had the support of the club's party members if he was willing to join the party.<ref>{{Cite book|last= Wright |first= Richard |editor= Crossman, Richard |title= The God That Failed |year= 1965 |publisher= [[Bantam Books]] |location= New York |pages= 109–110 |chapter= Richard Wright }}</ref>

In 1933, Wright founded the [[South Side Writers Group]], whose members included [[Arna Bontemps]] and [[Margaret Walker]].<ref>{{Cite book|last=Knupfer|first=Anne Meis|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/60373441|title=The Chicago Black renaissance and women's activism|date=2006|publisher=University of Illinois Press|isbn=978-0252030475|location=Urbana|oclc=60373441}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Chicago Black Renaissance|url=http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/240.html|access-date=2021-04-05|website=www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org}}</ref> Through the group and his membership in the John Reed Club, Wright founded and edited ''Left Front'', a literary magazine. Wright began publishing his poetry ("A Red Love Note" and "Rest for the Weary", for example) there in 1934.<ref name=":4">{{Cite journal|last=Reilly|first=John M.|date=June 1972|title=Richard Wright's Apprenticeship|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2783633|journal=Journal of Black Studies|volume=2| issue =  4|pages=439–460|doi=10.1177/002193477200200403|jstor=2783633|s2cid=141107480}}</ref> There is dispute about the demise in 1935 of ''Left Front Magazine'' as Wright blamed the Communist Party despite his protests.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Wright|title=The God That Failed|year=1965|editor=Crossman|pages=121|chapter=Richard Wright}}</ref> It is, however, likely due to the proposal at the 1934 Midwest Writers Congress that the John Reed Club be replaced by a Communist Party-sanctioned First American Party Congress.{{citation needed|date=April 2021}} Throughout this period, Wright continued to contribute to ''New Masses'' magazine, revealing the path his writings would ultimately take.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Foley|first=Barbara|date=2015|title=Barbara Foley Online Review : Earle V. Bryant, ed., Byline, Richard Wright: Articles from the Daily Worker and New Masses (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2015), 282 pp + i–xix|url=https://academic.oup.com/DocumentLibrary/ALH/Online%20Review%20Series%205/Barbara%20Foley%20Online%20Review%20V.pdf |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/https://academic.oup.com/DocumentLibrary/ALH/Online%20Review%20Series%205/Barbara%20Foley%20Online%20Review%20V.pdf |archive-date=2022-10-09 |url-status=live|website=academic.oup.com}}</ref>

By 1935, Wright had completed the manuscript of his first novel, ''Cesspool'', which was rejected by eight publishers and published posthumously as ''Lawd Today'' (1963).<ref name=":0" /><ref name=jbhe>{{Cite journal|title=The Enduring Importance of Richard Wright|url=https://www.jbhe.com/features/59_richardwright.html|access-date=2021-04-08|journal=[[The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education]]|first=Milton|last=Moskowitz}}</ref> This first work featured autobiographical anecdotes about working at a post office in Chicago during the Great Depression.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Simmons|first=Kristen Jere|date=2019-05-21|title=A Space of His Own|url=https://southsideweekly.com/a-space-of-his-own-richard-wright/|access-date=2021-04-08|website=South Side Weekly|language=en-US}}</ref>

In January 1936, his story "Big Boy Leaves Home" was accepted for publication in the anthology ''New Caravan'' and the anthology ''Uncle Tom's Children'', focusing on black life in the rural American South.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Big Boy Leaves Home by Richard Wright, 1938 |url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/big-boy-leaves-home-richard-wright-1938|access-date=2020-12-17|website=www.encyclopedia.com}}</ref>

In February of that year, he began working with the [[National Negro Congress]] (NNC), speaking at the Chicago convention on "The Role of the Negro Artist and Writer in the Changing Social Order".<ref name=":2">{{Cite book|last=Gellman|first=Erik S.|title=Death Blow to Jim Crow|publisher=University of South Carolina Press|year=2012|isbn=978-0807835319|location=Chapel Hill|pages=26}}</ref> His ultimate goal (looking at other labor unions as inspiration) was the development of NNC-sponsored publications, exhibits, and conferences alongside the [[Federal Writers' Project]] to get work for black artists.<ref name=":2" />

In 1937, he became the Harlem editor of the ''[[Daily Worker]]''. This assignment compiled quotes from interviews preceded by an introductory paragraph, thus allowing him time for other pursuits like the publication of ''Uncle Tom's Children'' a year later.<ref name=":4" />

Pleased by his positive relations with white Communists in Chicago, Wright was later humiliated in New York City by some white party members who rescinded an offer to find housing for him when they learned his race.<ref>{{Cite book|last= Wright |editor= Crossman |title= The God That Failed |year= 1965 |pages= 123–126 |chapter= Richard Wright }}</ref>  Some black Communists denounced Wright as a "[[bourgeois]] intellectual". Wright was essentially [[Autodidacticism|autodidactic]]. He had been forced to end his public education to support his mother and brother after completing junior high school.<ref>{{Cite book|last= Wright |editor= Crossman |title= The God That Failed |year= 1965|pages= 13–16 |chapter= Richard Wright }}</ref>

Throughout the Soviet pact with Nazi Germany in 1940, Wright continued to focus his attention on racism in the United States.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|title=Richard Wright and Stalinism {{!}} Workers' Liberty|url=https://www.workersliberty.org/story/2019-02-28/richard-wright-and-stalinism|first=Dan|last=Katz|date=February 27, 2019|access-date=2021-04-08|website=www.workersliberty.org}}</ref> He would ultimately break from the Communist Party when they broke from a tradition against segregation and racism and joined Stalinists supporting the US entering World War II in 1941.<ref name=":3" />

Wright insisted that young communist writers be given space to cultivate their talents. He later described this episode through his fictional character Buddy Nealson, [[Communist Party USA and African Americans|an African-American communist]], in his essay "I tried to be a Communist", published in the ''Atlantic Monthly'' in 1944. This text was an excerpt of his autobiography scheduled to be published as ''American Hunger'' but was removed from the actual publication of ''[[Black Boy]]'' upon request by the [[Book of the Month Club]].<ref>{{Cite book|last=Wright|title=The God That Failed|year=1960|editor=Crossman|pages=126–134|chapter=Richard Wright}}. It remained an essay until the publication of ''American Hunger'' in 1977 and the complete ''Black Boy (American Hunger)'' in 1991. James Zeigler: ''Red Scare Racism and Cold War Black Radicalism.'' Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2015, pp. 72–73.</ref> Indeed, his relations with the party turned violent; Wright was threatened at knifepoint by [[fellow traveler|fellow-traveler]] co-workers, denounced as a [[Trotskyism|Trotskyite]] in the street by strikers, and physically assaulted by former comrades when he tried to join them during the 1936 [[International Workers' Day|Labour Day]] march.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Wright|title=The God That Failed|year=1965|pages=143–145|chapter=Richard Wright}}</ref>

==Career==

In Chicago in 1932, Wright began writing with the [[Federal Writers' Project|Federal Writer's Project]] and became a member of the [[Communist Party USA|American Communist Party]]. In 1937, he relocated to New York and became the Bureau Chief of the communist publication, the ''[[Daily Worker]]''.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Richard Wright {{!}} Biography, Books, & Facts|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Richard-Wright-American-writer|access-date=2020-12-12|website=Encyclopædia Britannica|language=en}}</ref> He would write more than 200 articles for the publication from 1937 to 1938. This allowed him to cover stories and issues that interested him, revealing depression-era America into light with well-written prose.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Wright|first=Richard|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/867020649|title=Byline, Richard Wright: Articles from the Daily Worker and New Masses|editor-last=Bryant |editor-first=Earle V.|year=2015|isbn=978-0826220202|publisher=[[University of Missouri Press]]|location=Columbia|oclc=867020649}}</ref>

He worked on the Federal Writers' Project guidebook to the city, ''New York Panorama'' (1938), and wrote the book's essay on [[Harlem]]. Through the summer and fall, Wright wrote more than 200 articles for the ''Daily Worker'' and helped edit a short-lived literary magazine, ''New Challenge''. The year was also a landmark for him because he met and developed a friendship with writer [[Ralph Ellison]] that would last for years. Wright was awarded the ''[[Story (magazine)|Story]]'' magazine first prize of $500 for his short story "Fire and Cloud".<ref name="story" />

After receiving the ''Story'' prize in early 1938, Wright shelved his manuscript of ''Lawd Today'' and dismissed his literary agent, John Troustine. He hired Paul Reynolds, the well-known agent of poet [[Paul Laurence Dunbar]], to represent him. Meanwhile, the Story Press offered the publisher [[Harper & Row|Harper]] all of Wright's prize-entry stories for a book, and Harper agreed to publish the collection.

Wright gained national attention for the collection of four short stories entitled ''[[Uncle Tom's Children]]'' (1938). He based some stories on [[Lynching in the United States|lynching]] in the [[Deep South]]. The publication and favorable reception of ''Uncle Tom's Children'' improved Wright's status with the Communist Party and enabled him to establish a reasonable degree of financial stability. He was appointed to the editorial board of ''New Masses''. [[Granville Hicks]], a prominent literary critic and Communist sympathizer, introduced him at leftist teas in [[Boston]]. By May 6, 1938, excellent sales had provided Wright with enough money to move to Harlem, where he began writing the novel ''[[Native Son]]'', which was published in 1940.

Based on his collected short stories, Wright applied for and was awarded a [[Guggenheim Fellowship]], which gave him a stipend allowing him to complete ''Native Son.'' During this period, he rented a room in the home of friends Herbert and Jane Newton, an interracial couple and prominent [[Communists]] whom Wright had known in Chicago.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T6-lhNKL3ncC&q=Herbert+and+jane+Newton&pg=PT147|title=Literary Brooklyn: The Writers of Brooklyn and the Story of American City Life|first=Evan|last=Hughes|date=2011|publisher=Macmillan|access-date=September 30, 2016|via=Google Books|isbn=978-1429973069}}</ref> They had moved to New York and lived at 109 Lefferts Place in [[Brooklyn]], in the [[Fort Greene Historic District|Fort Greene]] neighborhood.<ref>{{cite news|last=Oleksinski|first=Johnny|url=https://nypost.com/2017/04/14/find-out-if-new-yorks-greatest-writers-lived-next-door/ |title=Find out if New York's greatest writers lived next door|newspaper=The New York Post|date=April 14, 2017|access-date=April 14, 2017}}</ref>

After publication, ''Native Son'' was selected by the [[Book of the Month Club]] as its first book by an African-American author. It was a daring choice. The lead character, [[Bigger Thomas]], is bound by the limitations that society places on African Americans. Unlike most in this situation, he gains his own [[Agency (philosophy)|agency]] and self-knowledge only by committing heinous acts. Wright's characterization of Bigger led to him being criticized for his concentration on violence in his works. In the case of ''Native Son'', people complained that he portrayed a black man in ways that seemed to confirm whites' worst fears. The period following publication of ''Native Son'' was a busy time for Wright. In July 1940, he went to Chicago to do research for a folk history of blacks to accompany photographs selected by [[Edwin Rosskam]]. While in Chicago, he visited the [[American Negro Exposition]] with [[Langston Hughes]], [[Arna Bontemps]] and [[Claude McKay]].

[[File:Canada-Lee-Native-Son-1941.jpg|thumb|[[Canada Lee]] as [[Bigger Thomas]] in the [[Orson Welles]] production of ''[[Native Son (play)|Native Son]]'' (1941)]]
Wright traveled to [[Chapel Hill, North Carolina]], to collaborate with playwright [[Paul Green (playwright)|Paul Green]] on a dramatic adaptation of ''Native Son.'' In January 1941 Wright received the prestigious [[Spingarn Medal]] of the [[NAACP]] for noteworthy achievement. His play ''[[Native Son (play)|Native Son]]'' opened on Broadway in March 1941, with [[Orson Welles]] as director, to generally favorable reviews. Wright also wrote the text to accompany a volume of photographs chosen by Rosskam, which were almost completely drawn from the files of the [[Farm Security Administration]]. The FSA had employed top photographers to travel around the country and capture images of Americans. Their collaboration, ''[[12 Million Black Voices|12 Million Black Voices: A Folk History of the Negro in the United States]]'', was published in October 1941 to wide critical acclaim.

Wright's memoir ''[[Black Boy]]'' (1945) describes his early life from [[Roxie, Mississippi|Roxie]] up until his move to Chicago at the age of 19. It includes his clashes with his [[Seventh-day Adventist Church|Seventh-day Adventist]] family, his troubles with white employers, and social isolation. It also describes his intellectual journey through these struggles. ''American Hunger'', which was published posthumously in 1977, was originally intended by Wright as the second volume of ''Black Boy''. The [[Library of America]] edition of 1991 finally restored the book to its original two-volume form.<ref>{{cite web| url=https://reason.com/2021/09/25/when-the-native-son-became-the-man-who-lived-underground/| author=Damon Root| title=When the 'Native Son' Became 'The Man Who Lived Underground'| publisher=Reason| date=October 2021}}</ref>

''American Hunger'' details Wright's participation in the John Reed Clubs and the Communist Party, which he left in 1942. The book implies he left earlier, but he did not announce his withdrawal until 1944.<ref>{{cite book |last=Wright |first=Richard |editor1-last=Kinnamon |editor1-first=Keneth |editor2-last=Fabre |editor2-first=Michel |date=1993 |title=Conversations with Richard Wright |location=Mississippi |publisher=University of Mississippi |page=xix |isbn=0878056327}}</ref> In the book's restored form, Wright used the [[diptych]] structure to compare the certainties and intolerance of organized communism, which condemned "bourgeois" books and certain members, with similar restrictive qualities of fundamentalist organized religion. Wright disapproved of [[Joseph Stalin]]'s [[Great Purge]] in the [[Soviet Union]].

===Move to France, later life and death===
[[File:Plaque Richard Wright, 14 rue Monsieur-le-Prince, Paris 6.jpg|thumbnail|Plaque commemorating Wright's residence in Paris, at 14, [[Rue Monsieur-le-Prince|rue Monsieur le Prince]].]]

Following a stay of a few months in [[Québec]], Canada, including a lengthy stay in the village of Sainte-Pétronille on the [[Île d'Orléans]],<ref>Jean-Christophe Cloutier, Introduction to ''Jack Kerouac, La vie est d'hommage'' (Boréal, 2016), pp. 31–32.</ref> Wright moved to Paris in 1946. He became a permanent American [[expatriate]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.math.buffalo.edu/~sww/wright/wright_bio.html|title=Richard Wright Biography|access-date=September 30, 2016}}</ref>

In Paris, Wright became friends with French writers [[Jean-Paul Sartre]] and [[Albert Camus]], whom he had met while still in New York, and he and his wife became particularly good friends with [[Simone de Beauvoir]], who stayed with them in 1947.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Bakewell|first=Sarah|title=At the Existentialist Café: Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails|publisher=Other Press|year=2016|isbn=978-1590514894|pages=171}}</ref> However, as Michel Fabre argues, Wright's existentialist leanings were more influenced by [[Søren Kierkegaard]], [[Edmund Husserl]], and especially [[Martin Heidegger]].<ref>Fabre, Michel (1993). ''The Unfinished Quest of Richard Wright''. Tr. Isabel Barzun. Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press. pp. 374.</ref> In following Fabre's argument, with respect to Wright's existentialist proclivities during the period of 1946 to 1951, Hue Woodson suggests that Wright's exposure to Husserl and Heidegger "directly came as an intended consequence of the inadequacies of Sartre's synthesis of [[existentialism]] and [[Marxism]] for Wright".<ref>Woodson, Hue (2019). "Heidegger and ''The Outsider'', ''Savage Holiday'', and ''The Long Dream''" in ''Critical Insights: Richard Wright'', Ed. Kimberly Drake. Amenia, NY: Grey House, p. 62.</ref>  His [[Existentialist]] phase was expressed in his second novel, ''[[The Outsider (Richard Wright)|The Outsider]]'' (1953), which described an African-American character's involvement with the Communist Party in New York. He also became friends with fellow expatriate writers [[Chester Himes]] and [[James Baldwin]]. His relationship with the latter ended in acrimony after Baldwin published his essay "Everybody's Protest Novel"<ref name=jbhe /> (collected in ''[[Notes of a Native Son]]''), in which he criticized Wright's portrayal of Bigger Thomas as stereotypical. In 1954 Wright published ''Savage Holiday''.

After becoming a French citizen in 1947, Wright continued to travel through Europe, Asia, and Africa. He drew material from these trips for numerous nonfiction works. In 1949, Wright contributed to the anti-communist anthology ''[[The God That Failed]];'' his essay had been published in the ''[[Atlantic Monthly]]'' three years earlier and was derived from the unpublished portion of ''Black Boy.'' He was invited to join the [[Congress for Cultural Freedom]], which he rejected, correctly suspecting that it had connections with the [[CIA]]. Fearful of links between African Americans and communists, the [[FBI]] had Wright under surveillance starting in 1943. With the heightened communist fears of the 1950s, Wright was [[Hollywood blacklist|blacklisted]] by Hollywood movie studio executives. But in 1950, he starred as Bigger Thomas in an [[Argentina|Argentinian]] film version of ''[[Native Son (1951 film)|Native Son]].''

In mid-1953, Wright traveled to the [[Gold Coast (region)|Gold Coast]], where [[Kwame Nkrumah]] was leading the country to independence from British rule, to be established as [[Ghana]]. Before Wright returned to Paris, he gave a confidential report to the United States consulate in [[Accra]] on what he had learned about Nkrumah and his political party. After Wright returned to Paris, he met twice with an officer from the [[United States Department of State|U.S. State Department]]. The officer's report includes what Wright had learned from Nkrumah's adviser [[George Padmore]] about Nkrumah's plans for the Gold Coast after independence. Padmore, a [[Trinidad]]ian living in London, believed Wright to be a good friend. His many letters in the Wright papers at Yale's Beinecke Library attest to this, and the two men continued their correspondence. Wright's book on his African journey, ''[[Black Power (Richard Wright book)|Black Power]]'', was published in 1954; its London publisher was [[Dennis Dobson]], who also published Padmore's work.<ref>Carol Polsgrove, ''Ending British Rule in Africa: Writers in a Common Cause'' (2009), pp. 125–28.</ref>

Whatever political motivations Wright had for reporting to American officials, he was also an American who wanted to stay abroad and needed their approval to have his passport renewed. According to Wright biographer [[Addison Gayle]], a few months later Wright talked to officials at the American embassy in Paris about people he had met in the Communist Party; at the time these individuals were being prosecuted in the US under the [[Smith Act]].<ref>Carol Polsgrove, ''Divided Minds: Intellectuals and the Civil Rights Movement'' (2001), p. 82.</ref>

Historian Carol Polsgrove explored why Wright appeared to have little to say about the increasing activism of the [[civil rights movement]] during the 1950s in the United States. She found that he was under what his friend Chester Himes called "extraordinary pressure" to avoid writing about the US.<ref name="polsgrove80-81"/> As ''[[Ebony (magazine)|Ebony]]'' magazine delayed publishing his essay "I Choose Exile", Wright finally suggested publishing it in a white periodical. He believed that "a white periodical would be less vulnerable to accusations of disloyalty".<ref name="polsgrove80-81"/> He thought the ''[[Atlantic Monthly]]'' was interested, but in the end, the piece went unpublished.<ref name="polsgrove80-81">Polsgrove, ''Divided Minds'', pp. 80–81.</ref><ref>Wright, Richard (1951), [https://uploads-ssl.webflow.com/5c54c9afc8a5790510b95009/5d58141d83100b29bb005da9_Richard%20Wright%20-%20I%20Choose%20Exile.pdf The essay "I Choose Exile"]. Retrieved November 25, 2024.</ref>

In 1955, Wright visited [[Indonesia]] for the [[Bandung Conference]].<ref name=":Gao">{{Cite book |last=Gao |first=Yunxiang |title=Arise, Africa! Roar, China! Black and Chinese Citizens of the World in the Twentieth Century |date=2021 |publisher=[[University of North Carolina Press]] |isbn=9781469664606 |location=Chapel Hill|pages=38}}</ref> He recorded his observations on the conference as well as on Indonesian cultural conditions in ''[[The Color Curtain|The Color Curtain: A Report on the Bandung Conference]]''. Wright praised the conference extensively.<ref name=":Gao" /> He gave at least two lectures to Indonesian cultural groups, including [[PEN Club]] Indonesia, and he interviewed Indonesian artists and intellectuals in preparation to write ''The Color Curtain''.<ref>{{cite book|last=Roberts|first=Brian|title=Artistic Ambassadors: Literary and International Representation of the New Negro Era|publisher=University of Virginia Press|location=Charlottesville|pages=153–153, 161}}</ref> Several Indonesian artists and intellectuals whom Wright met, later commented on how he had depicted Indonesian cultural conditions in his [[travel writing]].<!-- saying what? he got it or did not? --><ref>{{cite journal|last=Vuyk|first=Beb|title=A Weekend with Richard Wright|journal=PMLA|date=May 2011|volume=126|issue=3|pages=810|doi=10.1632/pmla.2011.126.3.798|s2cid=162272235}}</ref>

Other works by Wright included ''White Man, Listen!'' (1957) and a novel ''The Long Dream'' (1958), which was adapted as a play and produced in New York in 1960 by [[Ketti Frings]]. It explores the relationship between a man named Fish and his father.<ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0904.html "Richard Wright, Writer, 52, Dies"], ''[[The New York Times]]'', November 30, 1960.</ref> A collection of [[short story|short stories]], ''Eight Men'', was published posthumously in 1961, shortly after Wright's  death. These works dealt primarily with the poverty, anger, and protests of northern and southern urban black Americans.

His agent, Paul Reynolds, sent strongly negative criticism of Wright's 400-page ''Island of Hallucinations'' manuscript in February 1959.{{citation needed|date=August 2021}} Despite that, in March Wright outlined a novel in which his character Fish was to be liberated from racial conditioning and become dominating. By May 1959, Wright wanted to leave Paris and live in London. He felt French politics had become increasingly submissive to United States pressure. The peaceful Parisian atmosphere he had enjoyed had been shattered by quarrels and attacks instigated by enemies of the expatriate black writers.

On June 26, 1959, after a party marking the French publication of ''White Man, Listen!'', Wright became ill. He suffered a virulent attack of [[amoebic dysentery]], probably contracted during his 1953 stay on the Gold Coast. By November 1959, his wife had found a London apartment, but Wright's illness and "four hassles in twelve days" with British immigration officials ended his desire to live in England.{{citation needed|date=August 2021}}

On February 19, 1960, Wright learned from his agent Reynolds that the New York premiere of the stage adaptation of ''The Long Dream'' had received such bad reviews that the adapter, Ketti Frings, had decided to cancel further performances. Meanwhile, Wright was running into added problems trying to get ''The Long Dream'' published in France. These setbacks prevented his finishing revisions of ''Island of Hallucinations'', for which he was trying to get a publication commitment from [[Doubleday (publisher)|Doubleday and Company]].

In June 1960, Wright recorded a series of discussions for French radio, dealing primarily with his books and literary career. He also addressed the racial situation in the United States and the world, and specifically denounced American policy in Africa. In late September, to cover extra expenses for his daughter Julia's move from London to Paris to attend the [[University of Paris|Sorbonne]], Wright wrote blurbs for record jackets for Nicole Barclay, director of the largest record company in Paris.

In spite of his financial straits, Wright refused to compromise his principles. He declined to participate in a series of programs for Canadian radio because he suspected American control. For the same reason, he rejected an invitation from the Congress for Cultural Freedom to go to India to speak at a conference in memory of [[Leo Tolstoy]]. Still interested in literature, Wright helped [[Kyle Onstott]] get his novel ''[[Mandingo (novel)|Mandingo]]'' (1957) published in France.

Wright's last display of explosive energy occurred on November 8, 1960, in his polemical lecture "The Situation of the Black Artist and Intellectual in the United States", delivered to students and members of the [[American Church in Paris]]. He argued that American society reduced the most militant members of the black community to slaves whenever they wanted to question the racial status quo. He offered as proof the subversive attacks of the Communists against ''Native Son'' and the quarrels that [[James Baldwin (writer)|James Baldwin]] and other authors sought with him. On November 26, 1960, Wright talked enthusiastically with Langston Hughes about his work ''Daddy Goodness'' and gave him the manuscript.
[[File:Père-Lachaise - Division 87 - Columbarium - Octobre 2015 - 11.jpg|thumb|Wright's grave in [[Père Lachaise Cemetery]], Paris]]
Wright died of a heart attack in Paris on November 28, 1960, at the age of 52. He was interred in [[Père Lachaise Cemetery]].<ref>https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0904.html&ved=2ahUKEwjQurK23cb_AhWGkWoFHTToCQkQFnoECDUQAQ&usg=AOvVaw26ghzbJUji6I8U88xYYxeo{{Dead link|date=July 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/18/arts/artparis-on-his-mind.html|title=ART {{!}} Paris on His Mind|first=Clarence|last=Major|author-link=Clarence Major|newspaper=The New York Times|date=February 18, 1996}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://hazelrowley.com/books/book-3/|title=Richard Wright: The Life and Times|first=Hazel|last=Rowley|website=Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship|access-date=November 26, 2024}}</ref> Wright's daughter Julia has claimed that her father was murdered.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/rwright.htm |title=Richard Wright |website=Books and Writers (kirjasto.sci.fi) |first=Petri |last=Liukkonen |publisher=[[Kuusankoski]] Public Library |location=Finland |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080518164622/http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/rwright.htm |archive-date=May 18, 2008 |url-status=dead  }}</ref>

A number of Wright's works have been published posthumously. In addition, some of Wright's more shocking passages dealing with race, sex, and politics were cut or omitted before original publication of works during his lifetime. In 1991, unexpurgated versions of ''Native Son'', ''Black Boy'', and his other works were published. In addition, in 1994, his novella ''Rite of Passage'' was published for the first time.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1994/02/13/books/children-s-books-black-history-bookshelf.html |title=Children's Books/Black History; Bookshelf |newspaper=The New York Times |date=February 13, 1994}}</ref>

In the last years of his life, Wright had become enamored of the Japanese poetic form [[Haiku in English|haiku]] and wrote more than 4,000 such short poems. In 1998 a book was published (''Haiku: This Other World'') with 817 of his own favorite haiku. Many of these haiku have an uplifting quality even as they deal with coming to terms with loneliness, death, and the forces of nature.

A collection of Wright's travel writings was published by the [[University Press of Mississippi]] in 2001. At his death, Wright left an unfinished book, ''A Father's Law'',<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/24/books/review/Powers-t.html?_r=0 |title=Ambiguities |author-link=Ron Powers|first=Ron|last=Powers|newspaper=The New York Times |date=February 24, 2008}}</ref> dealing with a black policeman and the son he suspects of murder. His daughter Julia Wright published ''A Father's Law'' in January 2008. An omnibus edition containing Wright's political works was published under the title ''Three Books from Exile: Black Power; The Color Curtain''; and ''White Man, Listen!''

==Personal life==
In August 1939, with [[Ralph Ellison]] as best man,<ref>[[Hazel Rowley|Rowley, Hazel]] (2001), ''Richard Wright: The Life and Times'', University of Chicago Press, p. 177.</ref> Wright married Dhimah Rose Meidman,<ref>[http://www.nathanielturner.com/richardwright3.htm "Richard N. Wright (1908–1960), Bio-Chronology"].  {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190223061206/http://www.nathanielturner.com/richardwright3.htm |date=February 23, 2019 }}, ''Chicken Bones: A Journal for Literary & Artistic African-American Themes''.</ref> a modern dance teacher of Russian Jewish ancestry. The marriage ended a year later.

On March 12, 1941, Wright married Ellen Poplar (née Poplowitz),<ref>Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham (eds), [https://books.google.com/books?id=E_vRLcgEdGoC&dq=%22ellen+poplowitz%22+henry+louis+gates&pg=PA555 ''Harlem Renaissance Lives: From the African American National Biography''], Oxford University Press, 2009, p. 555.</ref><ref name=family>{{Cite web|url=http://dailyfreeman.com/news/remembering-richard-wright/article_ba77c755-186d-5c62-9b80-4ae29f4ce695.html|title=Remembering Richard Wright|website=Daily Freeman|date=December 18, 2008|access-date=October 30, 2019}}</ref> a Communist organizer from Brooklyn.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/s_z/r_wright/chronology.htm|title=A Richard Wright Chronology|access-date=September 30, 2016|archive-date=February 24, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170224082814/http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/s_z/r_wright/chronology.htm|url-status=dead}}</ref> They had two daughters: Julia, born in 1942, and Rachel, born in 1949.<ref name=family/>

Ellen Wright, who died on April 6, 2004, aged 92, was the executor of Wright's estate. In this capacity, she unsuccessfully sued a biographer, the poet and writer [[Margaret Walker]], in ''[[Wright v. Warner Books, Inc.]]'' She was a literary agent, and her clients included [[Simone de Beauvoir]], [[Eldridge Cleaver]], and [[Violette Leduc]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hCDwvrfxD1sC&q=%22ellen+wright%22+literary+agent+Simone+de+Beauvoir+Cleaver&pg=PA162|title=American Night: The Literary Left in the Era of the Cold War|first=Alan M.|last=Wald|author-link=Alan M. Wald|page=162|publisher=The University of North Carolina Press|location=Chapel Hill|date=2012|isbn=978-0807835869}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2006/jan/07/featuresreviews.guardianreview25|title=The Island affair|first=James|last=Campbell|author-link=James Campbell (author)|newspaper=The Guardian|date= January 7, 2006}}</ref>

==Awards and honors==
* The [[Spingarn Medal]] in 1941 from the NAACP<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |title= The Spingarn Medal, 1915–2007 |encyclopedia=World Almanac & Book of Facts |pages=256 |publisher = World Almanac Education Group, Inc |year = 2008 }}</ref>
* [[Guggenheim Fellowship]] in [[List of Guggenheim Fellowships awarded in 1939|1939]]
* ''[[Story (magazine)|Story]]'' Magazine Award in 1938.<ref name="story">{{Cite book| last = Wright |title=Black Boy |publisher=HarperCollins |year=1993 |location=New York |pages= 465 }}</ref>
* In April 2009, Wright was featured on a [[Postage stamps and postal history of the United States|U.S. postage stamp]]. The 61-cent, two-ounce rate stamp is the 25th installment of the literary arts series, and features a portrait of Wright in front of snow-swept tenements on the South Side of Chicago, a scene that recalls the setting of ''Native Son.''<ref>{{Cite web|title=Richard Wright Immortalized on Postage|url=https://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2009/pr09_037.htm|access-date=2020-09-16|website=about.usps.com}}</ref>
* In 2010, Wright was inducted into the Chicago Literary Hall of Fame.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://chicagoliteraryhof.org/inductees/profile/richard-wright |title=Richard Wright |date=2010 |website=Chicago Literary Hall of Fame |language=en |access-date=October 15, 2017}}</ref>
* In 2012, the [[Historic Districts Council]] and the [[New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission]], in collaboration with the Fort Greene Association and writer/musician [[Carl Hancock Rux]], erected a cultural medallion at 175 Carlton Avenue, Brooklyn, where Wright lived in 1938 and completed ''[[Native Son]].''<ref>{{cite web|url=http://hdc.org/blog/cultural-medallions-celebrate-the-lives-of-two-african-american-pioneers-of-literature-and-music|title=Cultural Medallions Celebrate the Lives of Two African-American Pioneers of Literature and Music|date=July 3, 2012|access-date=September 30, 2016}}</ref> The group unveiled the plaque at a public ceremony with guest speakers, including playwright [[Lynn Nottage]] and  [[Brooklyn Borough President]] [[Marty Markowitz]].

== Legacy ==
[[File:Shimer College banned books 2013.jpg|thumb|[[Banned Books Week]] reading of ''Black Boy'' at [[Shimer College]] in 2013]]

''Black Boy'' became an instant best-seller upon its publication in 1945.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Richard Wright: A Biography|first=Debbie|last=Levy|page=97|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OvRc7mIiyQYC&pg=PA97|year=2007|publisher=Twenty-First Century Books |isbn=978-0822567936}}</ref> Wright's stories published during the 1950s disappointed some critics who said that his move to Europe had alienated him from African Americans and separated him from his emotional and psychological roots.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Richard Wright's Native Son|editor=Fraile, Ana|first=Caleb|last=Corkery|page=16|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=a4Nhxo-ECS8C&pg=PA16|chapter=Richard Wright and His White Audience: How the Author's Persona Gave ''Native Son'' Historical Significance|year=2007|publisher=Rodopi |isbn=978-9042022973}}</ref> Many of Wright's works failed to satisfy the rigid standards of [[New Criticism]] during a period when the works of younger black writers gained in popularity.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Richard Wright's Native Son|editor=Fraile|first=Philip|last=Goldstein|pages=26–27|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=a4Nhxo-ECS8C&pg=PA26|chapter=From Communism to Black Studies and Beyond: The Reception of Richard Wright's ''Native Son''|year=2007|publisher=Rodopi |isbn=978-9042022973}}</ref>

During the 1950s Wright grew more internationalist in outlook. While he accomplished much as an important public literary and political figure with a worldwide reputation, his creative work did decline.<ref>{{Cite web |url= http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/s_z/r_wright/r_wright.htm |title= Richard Wright (1908–1960) |access-date= October 7, 2008 |last= Mullen |first= Bill |work= Modern American Poetry |publisher= [[University of Illinois]] |archive-date= December 17, 2008 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20081217062139/http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/s_z/r_wright/r_wright.htm |url-status= dead }}</ref>

While interest in ''Black Boy'' ebbed during the 1950s, this has remained one of his best selling books. Since the late 20th century, critics have had a resurgence of interest in it. ''Black Boy'' remains a vital work of historical, sociological, and literary significance whose seminal portrayal of one black man's search for self-actualization in a racist society strongly influenced the works of African-American writers who followed, such as [[James Baldwin]] and [[Ralph Ellison]]. [[John A. Williams]] included a fictionalized version of Wright's life and death in his 1967 novel ''[[The Man Who Cried I Am]]''.

It is generally agreed that the influence of Wright's ''Native Son'' is not a matter of literary style or technique.{{sfn|Corkery|2007|pp=17–28}} Rather, this book affected ideas and attitudes, and ''Native Son'' has been a force in the social and intellectual history of the United States in the last half of the 20th century. "Wright was one of the people who made me conscious of the need to struggle," said writer [[Amiri Baraka]].<ref>{{Cite web|url= http://www.itvs.org/RichardWright/more_info.html |title= Richard Wright – Black Boy |access-date=October 7, 2008 |publisher=[[Independent Television Service]] |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20080715231354/http://www.itvs.org/RichardWright/more_info.html <!-- Bot retrieved archive --> |archive-date = July 15, 2008}}</ref> 

During the 1970s and 1980s, scholars published critical essays about Wright in prestigious journals. Richard Wright conferences were held on university campuses from Mississippi to New Jersey. A new film version of ''Native Son'', with a screenplay by [[Richard Wesley]], was released in December 1986. Certain Wright novels became required reading in a number of American high schools, universities and colleges.<ref>{{Cite web|url= http://www.harpercollins.com/authors/10748/Richard_Wright/index.aspx|title= Richard Wright |access-date=October 7, 2008 |publisher= [[HarperCollins]] }}</ref>

Recent critics have called for a reassessment of Wright's later work in view of his philosophical project. Notably, [[Paul Gilroy]] has argued that "the depth of his philosophical interests has been either overlooked or misconceived by the almost exclusively literary inquiries that have dominated analysis of his writing".<ref>{{cite book|first=Sarah|last=Relyea|title=Outsider Citizens|location=New York City|publisher=[[Routledge]]|date=2006|page=62|isbn=978-0415975278}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|first=Paul|last=Gilroy|author-link=Paul Gilroy|title=The Black Atlantic|location=Cambridge, Massachusetts|publisher=[[Harvard University Press]]|date=1993|isbn=978-0674076068|page=147}}</ref>

Wright was featured in a 90-minute documentary about the WPA Writers' Project entitled ''Soul of a People: Writing America's Story'' (2009).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.smithsonianchannel.com/site/sn/show.do?show=135396|archive-url=http://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20121220204643/http://www.smithsonianchannel.com/site/sn/show.do?show=135396|url-status=dead|archive-date=December 20, 2012|title=Smithsonian Channel: Home|access-date=September 30, 2016}}</ref> His life and work during the 1930s is highlighted in the companion book, ''Soul of a People: The WPA Writers' Project Uncovers Depression America''.<ref>[http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470403802.html ''Soul of a People: The WPA Writers' Project Uncovers Depression America'' page at Wiley.] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121007072915/http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470403802.html |date=October 7, 2012 }}</ref>

== Publications ==

=== Collections ===
* ''[[Uncle Tom's Children]]'' (New York: Harper, 1938) (collection of [[novellas]])
* ''Eight Men'' (Cleveland and New York: World, 1961)
** "[[The Man Who Was Almost a Man]]"
** "The Man Who Lived Underground" (truncated version)
** "Big Black Man"
** "The Man Who Saw the Flood"
** "Man of All Work"
** "Man, God Ain't That..."
** "The Man Who Killed a Shadow"
** "The Man Who Went to Chicago"
* ''Early Works'' ([[Arnold Rampersad]], ed.) ([[Library of America]], 1989),
* ''Later Works'' (Arnold Rampersad, ed.) (Library of America, 1991).

=== Drama ===
* ''[[Native Son (play)|Native Son: The Biography of a Young American]]'' with [[Paul Green (playwright)|Paul Green]] (New York: Harper, 1941)

=== Novels ===
* ''[[Native Son]]'' (New York: Harper, 1940)
* ''[[The Outsider (Wright novel)|The Outsider]]''  (New York: Harper, 1953)
* ''Savage Holiday'' (New York: Avon, 1954)
* ''The Long Dream'' (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1958)
* ''Lawd Today'' (New York: Walker, 1963)
* ''Rite of Passage'' (New York: HarperCollins, 1994) (novella)
* ''A Father's Law'' (London: Harper Perennial, 2008) (unfinished novel)
* ''The Man Who Lived Underground'' (Library of America, 2021) (extended novel, as originally )

=== Non-fiction ===
* ''How "Bigger" Was Born; Notes of a Native Son'' (New York: Harper, 1940)
* ''[[12 Million Black Voices|12 Million Black Voices: A Folk History of the Negro in the United States]]'' (New York: Viking, 1941)
* ''[[Black Boy]]'' (New York: Harper, 1945)
* ''Black Power'' (New York: Harper, 1954)
* ''[[The Color Curtain]]'' (Cleveland and New York: World, 1956)
* ''Pagan Spain'' (New York: Harper, 1957)
* ''Letters to Joe C. Brown'' (Kent State University Libraries, 1968)
* ''American Hunger'' (New York: Harper & Row, 1977)
* ''Conversations with Richard Wright'' (University Press of Mississippi, 1993).
* ''Black Power: Three Books from Exile: "Black Power"; "The Color Curtain"; and "White Man, Listen!"'' (Harper Perennial, 2008)

=== Essays ===
* ''The Ethics of Living Jim Crow: An Autobiographical Sketch'' (1937)
* ''Introduction to Black Metropolis: A Study of Negro Life in a Northern City'' (1945)
* ''[[I Choose Exile (Richard Wright)|I Choose Exile]]'' (1951)
* ''White Man, Listen!'' (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1957)
* ''Blueprint for Negro Literature'' (New York City, New York) (1937)<ref>[http://www.nathanielturner.com/blueprintfornegroliterature.htm "Blueprint for Negro Literature"], ''ChickenBones: A Journal''.</ref>
* ''[[The God That Failed]]'' (contributor) (1949)

; Poetry
* ''Haiku: This Other World'' (eds. Yoshinobu Hakutani and Robert L. Tener; Arcade, 1998, {{ISBN|0385720246}})
** '''re-issue''' (''paperback''): ''Haiku: The Last Poetry of Richard Wright'' (Arcade Publishing, 2012), {{ISBN | 978-1-61145-349-2}}

== See also ==

* [[James Baldwin in France]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Additional resources==

===Books===
* Fabre, Michel. ''The World of Richard Wright'' (University Press of Mississippi, 1985).
* Fabre, Michel. ''The unfinished quest of Richard Wright'' (University of Illinois Press, 1993).
* Fishburn, Katherine. ''Richard Wright's Hero: The Faces of a Rebel-Victim'' (Scarecrow Press, 1977).
* Rampersad, Arnold, ed. ''Richard Wright: A Collection of Critical Essays'' (1994)
* Rowley, Hazel. ''Richard Wright: The Life and Times'' (University of Chicago Press, 2008).
* Smith, Virginia Whatley, ed. ''Richard Wright Writing America at Home and from Abroad'' (University Press of Mississippi, 2016).
* Ward, Jerry W., and Robert J. Butler, eds. ''The Richard Wright Encyclopedia'' (ABC-CLIO, 2008).
* {{Cite book | author-link = Richard Yarborough | last = Yarborough | first = Richard | chapter = Introduction | url = http://www.boonebridgebooks.com/Uncle_Toms_Children_Richard_Wright_Richard_Yarborough-i-0061450200 | archive-url = https://archive.today/20080707033227/http://www.boonebridgebooks.com/Uncle_Toms_Children_Richard_Wright_Richard_Yarborough-i-0061450200 | url-status = dead | archive-date = July 7, 2008 | title = Uncle Tom's Children | publisher = Harper Perennial Modern Classics | year = 2008 | access-date = June 4, 2008 }}
* {{Cite book | url = http://reconstruction.eserver.org/084/intro2.shtml | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20081224091440/http://reconstruction.eserver.org/084/intro2.shtml | url-status=dead | archive-date = December 24, 2008 | title = Special Centenary Section on 'Facing the Future After Richard Wright'| publisher = Reconstruction 8.4 | date =Winter 2008 | editor = Graham Barnfield and Joseph G. Ramsey }}

===Journal articles===
* Alsen, Eberhard. "'Toward The Living Sun': Richard Wright's Change Of Heart From 'The Outsider' To 'The Long Dream{{'"}}, ''[[CLA Journal]]'' 38.2 (1994): 211–227. {{jstor|44322590}}
* {{cite journal | last1 = Baldwin | first1 = James | author-link1 = James Baldwin | year = 1988 | title = Richard (Nathaniel) Wright | journal = Contemporary Literary Criticism | volume = 48 | pages = 415–430 | location = Detroit | publisher = Gale}}
* Bone, Robert. "Richard Wright and the Chicago Renaissance", ''[[Callaloo (journal)|Callaloo]]'' 28 (1986): 446–468. {{JSTOR|2930839}}
* Burgum, Edwin Berry. "The Promise of Democracy and the Fiction of Richard Wright", ''[[Science & Society]]'', vol. 7, no. 4 (Fall 1943), pp.&nbsp;338–352. {{JSTOR|40399551}}
* Bradley, M. (2018). "Richard Wright, Bandung, and the Poetics of the Third World". ''Modern American History'', ''1''(1), 147–150.
* Cauley, Anne O. "A Definition of Freedom in the Fiction of Richard Wright", ''CLA Journal'' 19.3 (1976): 327–346. {{jstor|44321617}}
* Cobb, Nina Kressner. "Richard Wright: exile and existentialism", ''[[Phylon]]'' 40.4 (1979): 362–374. {{jstor|274533}}
* {{cite journal | url = https://muse.jhu.edu/article/688064 | title = An Equation of Collectivity: We + You in Richard Wright's 12 Million Black Voices | first = Mehdi | last = Ghasemi | journal = Mosaic: An Interdisciplinary Critical Journal | pages = 71–86 | year = 2018| volume = 51 | issue = 1 | doi = 10.1353/mos.2018.0005 | s2cid = 165378945 }}
* Gines, Kathryn T. "'The Man Who Lived Underground': Jean-Paul Sartre And the Philosophical Legacy of Richard Wright", ''Sartre Studies International'' 17.2 (2011): 42–59.
* Knapp, Shoshana Milgram. "Recontextualizing Richard Wright's The Outsider: Hugo, Dostoevsky, Max Eastman, and Ayn Rand", in ''Richard Wright in a Post-Racial Imaginary'' (2014), pp.&nbsp;99–112.
* Meyerson, Gregory. "Aunt Sue's Mistake: False Consciousness in Richard Wright's 'Bright and Morning Star{{'"}}, in ''Reconstruction: Studies in Culture: 2008'' 8#4 [https://web.archive.org/web/20081224091515/http://reconstruction.eserver.org/084/meyerson.shtml online]
* {{cite journal | url = http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/englishfacpubs/3/ | title = "Sketches of Spain": Richard Wright's Pagan Spain and African-American Representations of the Hispanic | first = Guy | last = Reynolds | journal = [[Journal of American Studies]] | page = 34 | year = 2000}}
* Veninga, Jennifer Elisa. "Richard Wright: Kierkegaard's Influence as Existentialist Outsider", in ''Kierkegaard's Influence on Social-Political Thought'' (Routledge, 2016), pp.&nbsp;281–298.
* [[Widmer, Kingsley]], and Richard Wright. "The Existential Darkness: Richard Wright's 'The Outsider{{'"}}, ''Wisconsin Studies in Contemporary Literature'' 1.3 (1960): 13–21. {{jstor|1207231}}
* Woodson, Hue. "Heidegger and The Outsider, Savage Holiday, and The Long Dream", in Kimberly Drake (ed.), ''Critical Insights: Richard Wright'' (Amenia, NY: Grey House, 2019).

===Archival materials===
* [http://hdl.handle.net/10079/fa/beinecke.wright Richard Wright Papers]. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
* [https://archive.today/20130113021957/http://purl.oclc.org/umarchives/MUM00488/ Richard Wright Collection (MUM00488)] at the University of Mississippi.
* [http://www.chipublib.org/fa-horace-r-cayton-papers/ Richard Wright Book Project] materials in the papers of sociologist Horace R. Clayton Jr. at [[Chicago Public Library]]

==External links==
{{Wikiquote|Richard Wright}}
{{Commons category}}
* {{FadedPage|id=Wright, Richard|name=Richard Wright|author=yes}}
* {{Librivox author |id=18197}}
* The story of his life is retold in the 1949 radio drama "[https://archive.org/details/DestinationFreedom/DF_49-03-20_ep038-Black_Boy.mp3 Black Boy]", a presentation from ''[[Destination Freedom]]'', written by [[Richard Durham]]
{{Native Son}}
{{Spingarn Medal}}
{{Authority control}}

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