The Outsider

Rating:
Summary: Useful as a novel of ideas
Review: "The Outsider" is Wright's exploration of existentialism, which he became interested in while hanging out in France with Sartre, Camus and others. As a novel of ideas, it's a useful work for readers beginning to investigate existentialism. As literature, however, it's a heavy-handed, didactic exercise.

Like Camus' "The Stranger," Wright's work attacks the question of existential freedom: where does Man go if he cuts himself free from traditional moorings such as religion, family, political ideology? A worthy subject, but where "The Stranger" forces us to deal with the questions by considering the protagonist's actions, with little or no authorial intervention, Wright feels compelled far too often to intercede as narrator and explain the problem. This leads to him putting speeches in the mouths of his characters.

A further problem occurs when Wright places his main character, Cross Damon, in the middle of an ideological battle between the Communist Party and a "fascist" landlord of the apartment into which Damon has moved. This plot device is Wright's attempt to deal with his own estrangement from the Communist Party, which he detailed in the essay "The God That Failed."

Damon's rejection of the Communists further freights the novel with ideological baggage. Wright actually has his character embark, midway through the novel, on a speech to a roomful of people (who presumably were asleep by the time it ended) that runs well beyond the several-page mark! Wright (through Cross) slays his ideological demons in "The Outsider," but the victory feels hollow and it certainly detracts from the book's literary merit.

Wright made a far better effort at exploring existential ideas in "The Man Who Lived Underground," which is included in the book of short stories, "Eight Men." That story, well-conceived and written, will reward the reader far more than this overburdened novel.

Rating:
Summary: american existential
Review: A pioneer in Americam existentialism. One of my favorite books. A man is given a 'second chance' at not life but identity. The incompatability of ideals and reality serve as a catalyst to his acceptance to this opportunity. He explores many social differances such as politics and ethics (especially the issues of the marginilized society - race most prominantly). Some of the monologues are a bit more like a solilique than seems fitting for reality but they do not really come off as out of place. This is executed well, but not masterfully. The sypathetic 'harmony' between Cross and the hunchback works well along the lines of Michael Douglas and Robert Duvall in Falling Down; that is to say that they play a sort of reciprocal/yin-yang type role of dichotomy. Addresses the role of identity within the self and within society throughout the novel. The futility, the acceptance of futility, and the futility of that acceptance are dealt with. Though this may not be the best example ( I do not know, I have yet to read his entire output), it nonetheless exemplifies some of his strengths as a story teller. This is perhaps his strongest philisophical effort. I would suggest reading "The Man Who Lived Underground" (to be found in "8 Men") as a type of preface. "The Stranger" by Camus and "Naseau" by Sartre would also be in a related vein, though markedly different.

Rating:
Summary: "Talks not only to the black man, but to mankind."
Review: Intriguing and captivating tale and one of Richard Wright's most unappreciated works because of its extensive reading material. To people who would think that I say, why bother reading if you only find short books appealing. For those with the "stamina" to read this magnificent work of existentialist literature, you will find it was worth the time spent. The Outsider is wonderful for beginners delving into the realm of existentialism as well as the learned scholar of that school of thought or to read as a fictional work (although that may undermine Wright's intent.) ENJOY!!!

Rating:
Summary: Made me yawn through parts of Crime and Punishment
Review: Socially less valuable than Native Son, but better literature. Long overlooked book. If you read no other Wright book, read this one. Like Blackboy, gives an indepth look into American Communism. Despite obvious symbolism of blacks as "outsiders," is much more intriguing when race issue is put into backseat in favor of more universal idea. Can we judge those that are not capable of accepting a society's morality and rules by that society's standards and castigate them with that society's penalties? Is it inevitable that your life will catch up with you if you run away from it? Go and get yourself a copy.

Rating:
Summary: Wright's my favorite till the end...
Review: The outsider is a Bigger Thomas a.k.a Cross Damon, he is a man that questions everything around him and plans for his life, not death. Destiny helps him start his life in a different way in which he meets Eva, someone he comes to love and can understand him. But the communists are in the way and makes his life miserably after having him suspect of killing two of their Party members. It was sad at the end for him to die as Bigger die but it felt so real and sad to have such an ending.
This book once again makes Richard Wright the most coiuragious author of his time. If Bigger didn't know the Communists and how they work, Cross did and it can be said we have seen the other side of the coin. I recommend it to everybody, communist and facist alike!

Rating:
Summary: A thoroughly engrossing journey
Review: The Outsider is a thrilling novel that reads quickly, and memorably. Like "The Fugitive" our hero finds himself suddenly outside of both society and his own sense of identity. He is forced to recreate himself as he struggles to stay ahead of danger, only to find that his new persona liberates a charisma that thrusts him into the spotlight, threatening to betray him to his pursuers.

As in the "The Grapes of Wrath", our hero is forced to confront his concept of who and how he had lived while becoming both politically and ideologically self-aware. This transformative process remains as compelling, current, and relevant today as when Wright penned the novel.

This first-rate novel is given short shrift by those who enjoy genuflecting to the myth of an intellectual heritage, to which it owes no homage nor apology, above the thrilling strength of the prose itself.

The Fugitive is a zesty hoot of novel full of suspenseful twists and thoughtful choices.

Rating:
Summary: you could do worse
Review: three and a half stars...came across this one at a used bookstore and just started reading it ahead of the others i had on my list...at times, it reads like an anti-communist party document...i never realized so many blacks were actually involved in the party. it's this book that led me to read the crisis of the negro intellectual. i liked some of the speeches, but at times, it just seemed like wright spent too much time attacking things rather than just tell a good story, but when he tells the story, it is captivating...it was refreshing to see a black man who could outsmart the system, even if he didn't win in the end. oh well, such is life in america....

Rating:
Summary: Too much ideological baggage
Review: When I read this novel for the first time, as a young man exploring existential ideas, I was enthralled by it. I still feel that for younger readers trying to understand existentialism, "The Outsider" isn't a bad place to start. As a piece of literature, however, it is badly flawed, a novel too heavily freighted with ideas to maintain interest over 400-plus pages.

It's the story of a young intellectual, Cross Damon, caught in a dead-end postal job and in a series of family, romantic and financial problems. Wright does a fine job in the first sections of the novel capturing Cross's sense of purposelessness and dread. Indeed, when Wright sticks to describing what is going on in his protagonist's life, the book moves along nicely.

In later stages of the novel, however, after Cross has received an opportunity to remake his life -- to live out his life according to his own free choices -- the novel bogs down as Wright becomes more interested in illuminating philosophical ideas than in convincingly developing his characters. At one point, Wright has Cross engage in a nearly 20-page speech to a roomful of communists and assorted intellectuals. By the end of it, they, like the reader, are presumably asleep.

"The Outsider" borrows heavily from Camus's much more successful and compelling work, "The Stranger," which takes about a quarter of the pages Wright required in his novel to make the existential case. One senses that Wright, who hung out in Paris with Camus, Sartre and other French intellectuals, was anxious in "The Outsider" to show much he had learned. That's a shame, because anyone who has read "Black Boy," "Native Son," or "Twelve Million Black Voices" knows that Wright had plenty to teach his companions.

In the end, "The Outsider" is best ignored if you are looking for a memorable literary experience. If you are interested in Wright's journey as a writer and/or in the ideas of existentialism, give it a shot.

Rating:
Summary: Too much ideological baggage
Review: When I read this novel for the first time, as a young man exploring existential ideas, I was enthralled by it. I still feel that for younger readers trying to understand existentialism, "The Outsider" isn't a bad place to start. As a piece of literature, however, it is badly flawed, a novel too heavily freighted with ideas to maintain interest over 400-plus pages.

It's the story of a young intellectual, Cross Damon, caught in a dead-end postal job and in a series of family, romantic and financial problems. Wright does a fine job in the first sections of the novel capturing Cross's sense of purposelessness and dread. Indeed, when Wright sticks to describing what is going on in his protagonist's life, the book moves along nicely.

In later stages of the novel, however, after Cross has received an opportunity to remake his life -- to live out his life according to his own free choices -- the novel bogs down as Wright becomes more interested in illuminating philosophical ideas than in convincingly developing his characters. At one point, Wright has Cross engage in a nearly 20-page speech to a roomful of communists and assorted intellectuals. By the end of it, they, like the reader, are presumably asleep.

"The Outsider" borrows heavily from Camus's much more successful and compelling work, "The Stranger," which takes about a quarter of the pages Wright required in his novel to make the existential case. One senses that Wright, who hung out in Paris with Camus, Sartre and other French intellectuals, was anxious in "The Outsider" to show much he had learned. That's a shame, because anyone who has read "Black Boy," "Native Son," or "Twelve Million Black Voices" knows that Wright had plenty to teach his companions.

In the end, "The Outsider" is best ignored if you are looking for a memorable literary experience. If you are interested in Wright's journey as a writer and/or in the ideas of existentialism, give it a shot.