Reflections in Black: Richard Wright

Richard Wright was born in 1908 in Roxie, Miss., and would go on to become one of the most important literary voices in the 20th century. He began writing short stories before moving to Chicago in 1927 and became part of a new wave of Black urban intellectuals joining, and later abandoning, the Communist Party. Wright eventually moved to New York City in 1937 where he received federal funding to write through the Works Progress Administration. He published the classic work Native Son in 1940 and went on to write several other works including Black Boy, The Outsider, Black Power and White Man Listen. He used his writing to explore a variety of issues from anticolonialism to existentialism. This is his story.