Masking a fear or simply doing what he wants?
Greatly titled, the first book of Native Son is called Fear. This is in reference to the Bigger's fear of whites and the whiteness of the world, but also of the fear many people have, not necessarily black, but whites also. What Bigger fears leads him to do things he may not want to. When he kills the young heiress, he obviously wants to cover up what he has done. Do you think he has immense fear of what could happen to him, or do you think he believes this is just what he needs to do? When wraps the head in newspaper, does he just want to cover it up or does he want to cover up the fact that she is white, someone he has come to fear?
When he wakes the next morning, he feels a sense of being reborn. Is that because he is afraid of what will happen to him in the future, or does he really feel as though this was an experience to lead him a new life?
4 comments:
Bigger seems to fear the consequences simply out of habit. Earlier in the day when he was debating robbing Blum's, he was aware of what would happen if he was caught and found a way to avoid the situation because of it. I feel he is more nervous about looking weak at the hands of a white man rather than the physical reprocussions of his actions.
The next morning, he feels reborn because he knows no one witnessed what happened and he knows that if he stays in control and acts properly, jan will be suspected for his communist connections. The only guilt that remains may be the lingering memory of the white cat that witnessed the furnace scene. He is afraid that because one 'white' discovered him, other might as well.
I think when Bigger covers up what he has done to Mary, he is doing so out of fear of what is going to happen. He had just gotten the job hours beforehand and now he has smuggled the boss' daughter to death, so he is struggling to fix the situation. In regards to the being reborn question,Bigger loves power. As he is doing these things, and lying to cover them up he is feeling good because he made such quick decisions. I think this is one of the reasons he feels reborn the next morning, because he has gotten away with his crime, like Kristine said.
Bigger's ingrained fear of white culture only spells disaster for him; this is highlighted throughout the first book, eventually leading to Mary's death. In his mind, this is the ultimate act of defiance towards the white populace and as such he feels power, something he is not accustomed to having. Because of this, Bigger's fear of white people begins to subside as he grows into a role far from what he originally strove for.
I think that Bigger is product of determinalism when he kills Mary, both because of the situation of black people then and because of his belief that he can truly do nothing to help himself or those around him. From strangling Mary until he is caught, he feels free because he is no longer resisting what he considers inevitable: becoming the stereotypical black male. When he takes on this role, he seems able to escape reality by becoming dissociated from himself.
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