Native Son a Reading

I am sorry for the blubbering questions in my previous post, I have been Working long shifts and the Coffee crash happened in the most inopportune time. here are the questions, hopefully clearer.

I will start with the general question that caught my eye in the first section. Baldwin talks of the deliberate Isolation how do we as current readers view this idea. Specifically that how "Past humiliations should become associated not only with one’s traditional oppressors, but also with one’s kinfolk" (121). This then brings to mind our essay quote of the "Bad nigger". This for me read that the African Americans rather isolated themselves then confront the issues of their humiliation. In the sense that they avoid one another based on the fact they see the things they were put through in their brothers eyes. Is this the case? Is this then what Baldwin was going through himself? Was this a possible reason why he then need isolation to write. Why he traveled the world away from the America’s?

Later Baldwin mentions the way Freedom of Europe stresses the American so much that all he can do is pack his bags and run for home (127). But as we saw this was not the case some ran further. Like Baldwin himself some students ran to Russia or India, anywhere that was not home or as I see it, anywhere that was home. By this I mean that they traveled the world to find a home not feeling comfortable anywhere, those that did return home simply settled for the lesser of two evils, living imprisoned or living searching for a home.

Here I disagree with Baldwin; I don’t think Europe exhumed so much freedom that the student wanted the structure of home. Rather it exhumed the freedom to explore further. Europe was not a place to flee to, but rather a gate way to more opportunity.

Specifically when he discusses how all students are the same and when American come to understand the French they realize both know no more than the other. Yet it is here then that the realization of equality must hit. And though Baldwin states that it is at this time they discover their own country. But I feel this is not the case, I do not feel that they locate their own country, but rather that all countries are each others. Europe brings the realization that all land is the same in its simplistic form. It then allows for those that achieve this realization to settle anywhere as they feel the comfort to be at home. It works in France as that is where they felt the most appreciated, as least the most after living in the Americas.

My final question is quite simple and I ask it to illicit a response. We have spoken of Paris streets, taverns, clubs and pubs. We have defined these things as Paris. But by Baldwin's experience are the prison section and the prison system not France? I felt a metaphorical story here speaking of everything that is to come and be in France. Or in other words the French Experience.