Blueprint for Negro Writing

Abstract

Richard Wright argues that Negro writing has been detached from the lived experience of black people, especially black workers, in the United States. Wright contends that “Negro writers” have a moral responsibility to write about the lived experience of black Americans in terms reflecting the need for social and political revolution, rather than bland acceptance of an economic-political establishment that exploits and kills them. This responsibility will require a conscious shift on the part of “Negro writers,” a consciousness that embraces the nationalism of “Negro life.” Wright’s nationalism is not autarchic but rather part of the process that connects black people with others in their search for liberation.