Wright: Building Off Life Experiences to Create "Bigger Thomas"

People that surround you are apart of your life experience
and Richard Wright built off this aspect with his experience to create his character,
Bigger Thomas. The grandson of salves and the son of a sharecropper,Richard Wright
was   born on September 4,1908 in Mississippi and died in November 28,1960. While only
attending school until ninth grade, he had his first story published at 16 years old. He
then moved to New York City   in 1937 where he was an editor on the communist
newspaper, then, in 1940 published Native Son which bought fame and his freedom to
write. Richard Wright wrote Native Son to show America the actual interactions between
races. He believed the nation was facing a problem that could possibly destroy the
country if it was left alone, soon, leading to the creation of his character, Bigger
Thomas. This character was a boy growing up in the 1930s in Chicago. Growing up
without his father, living in poverty, and facing oppression he seems to have little
control over himself and his emotions. Richard Wright's life experiences relate to his
character, Bigger Thomas.
    Bigger No.1 was a bully from Wright's childhood who terrorized him and his friends to boost
his ego. Specifically, this boy uses harassment and violence
to feel better about himself. While explaining the first person who inspired Bigger
Thomas, Wright says, "we never recovered our toys unless we flattered him and made
him feel that he was superior." We see this same attitude in Bigger Thomas. While
Bigger begins to throw out the rat that he had recently killed, Wright states, "Bigger
laughed and approached the bed with the dangling rat, swinging it to and from like a
pendulum, enjoying his sister's fear." Bigger Thomas and Bigger No.1 both feel better
about themselves when they harass people. Whenever they feel inferior or threatened
they retaliate with violence. Bigger Thomas feels threatened because he feels lost and
dehumanized in an...