Richard Wright's Black Boy was written in 1943 and published two years later (1945) in the early years of his career. Wright wrote Black Boy as a response to the experiences he had growing up.[1] Given that Black Boy is partially autobiographical, many of the anecdotes stem from real experiences throughout Wright's childhood.[2] Richard Wright's family spent much of their lives in deep poverty, enduring hunger and illness, and frequently moving around the South, and finally north, in search of a better life.[1] Wright cites his family and childhood environment as the primary influence in his writing of the book.[3] Specifically, Wright's family's strong religious beliefs imposed on him throughout his childhood shaped his view of religion.[3] Similarly, the considerable distress--physical, mental, and emotional--that Wright experienced while growing up hungry is documented throughout much of Black Boy.[3]
Most generally, Wright credits the public influence of Black Boy to his description of the racial inequalities he was subjected to throughout his travels in America.[2] Wright recognized the power of reading and writing to stimulate "new ways of looking and seeing" at a young age.[2] When he was seventeen, he left Jackson to find work in Memphis where he became heavily involved in literary groups and publications and expanded on his use of words as the weapon "to tell, to march, to fight, to create a sense of hunger for the life that gnaws in us" that is seen in Black Boy.[1] Wright claims that he chose to write about the experiences referenced in Black Boy in an effort to "look squarely at his life, to build a bridge of words between him and the world".[3]
