action, 70, 72, 90–91; and crime/criminality, 174
Adams, John, 71
Addams, Jane, A New Conscience and an Ancient Evil, 150
Adorno, Theodor, 36
African American literature: Bigger Thomas (Native Son) as most lumpenproletarian character, 17, 49–51; bottom dogs fiction, 12, 40, 42–45, 55, 107; and Marxism, 170
African American studies, 9
African Americans: Arendt on, 91; black folk, 5, 34, 97, 108–9, 111, 113, 139–40, 160, 164–65, 169; black manhood, 53; black Marseilles lumpenproletariat, 38; black masculinity, 54, 76, 123; black vagabond, 39; blackness and criminality, 123–24; and blues music, 94; and Communist Party, 5–7, 9, 83–84, 112–13, 172; and dislocation, 17; Ellison cautions application of Marxist concept to, 94–95; folklore of, 11, 18, 160; and Homer, 119; invisibility of, 52, 66, 91; and labor, 161, 168; and lumpenproletariat, 3, 48, 163; and marginality, 47; and Marxism, 1–2, 4, 9, 19, 33, 52, 95, 117, 138, 170–72; oral traditions and music, 47; outside of social order, 3–4; and paper, 39; and philosophical method, 15–16; and revolutionary change, 3–4, 6, 33–34, 84, 169; and sterilization, 193n93; and technology, 102; transience as survival, 54; urban experience, 47; vernacular culture, 140; working class, 53. See also black culture; black lumpenproletariat; black Marxism; folk; recognition; subjectivity
African diaspora, 38–39
Agee, James, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, 35
Algren, Nelson, 12, 44–45, 55–56, 137; “A Lumpen,” 44; and Marx, 44–45; Somebody in Boots, 45
Allen, Danielle, 91
Althusser, Louis, 15, 34, 47–48, 51–52, 82, 98, 100, 103, 178; on subjectivity, 67, 70
The American Progress, 44
American Revolution, 70–71, 87
anarchism, 75
Anderson, Edward, Hungry Men, 43
Arendt, Hannah, 15–16, 51, 73, 78, 84, 89–92, 188n64; on African Americans, 91; The Human Condition, 69–70, 90; on labor, 69–70, 90–91; On Revolution, 70–71, 87; “Reflections on Little Rock,” 90–91; on women, 90
Armstrong, Arnold, Parched Earth, 41
Atteberry, Jeffrey, 198n19
Badiou, Alain, 101
Bakunin, Mikhail, 75; Statism and Anarchy, 75
Baldwin, James, 50, 116, 172; “Everybody’s Protest Novel,” 172; “Many Thousands Gone,” 172
Baltimore Afro-American (periodical), 115
Basset, Theodore, 115
Bates, Ruby, 7–8
Baudelaire, Charles, 36
Beauvoir, Simone de, 188n64
Benjamin, Walter, 36, 47; on ragpicker, 36
Berke, Nancy, 149–50, 163–64, 194n2
Berry, Abner, 115
black culture, 5–6, 9, 15, 46–48, 140, 169, 172, 174; and labor, 161; and literature, 48; and lumpenproletariat, 48
black folk. See folk
Black Lives Matter, 19
black lumpenproletariat, 19, 134, 163, 175; defined by Native Son as agent of revolutionary change, 17; and identity, 53; and marginality, 52; in Marseilles, 38; and recognition of subjectivity, 63; revolutionary potential of, 30–31, 53
black Marseilles lumpenproletariat, 38
black Marxism, 1–2, 4–5, 9–10, 19–20, 48, 53, 139, 159, 169; Ellison and Wright as coarticulators of, 118
Black Panther Party, 3, 15; dress style of, 3; and lumpenproletariat, 3–4, 9, 17, 20, 28–34; and Marx and Engels, 33–34; and Marxism, 4, 17, 28, 34, 178; Wright anticipates, 53
black vagabond, 39
blacks, transatlantic, and labor, 46
blues music, 47–48, 55, 94–95, 134; and African Americans, 94
Bobbio, Norberto, 104
Bonaparte, Louis-Napoléon, 22, 25
Booker, Chris, 33
bottom dogs fiction, 12, 40, 42–45, 55, 107
bourgeois political economy, 27
Brown, Carolyn J., 137
Brown, Cecil, 12, 33, 47–48, 140
bureaucratization, and revolutionary change, 112–13
Bussard, Robert, 21
Callahan, John F., 98
Cantwell, Robert, The Land of Plenty, 41
capitalism, 7, 31–32, 43, 45; and Bigger Thomas (Native Son), 51–52; and catharsis, 104; and crime, 157; and Jim Crow, 62, 102, 104–5, 120, 126–27, 126–28, 135; and labor, 84; and lumpenproletariat, 138, 158, 160, 175; and nationalism, 58; and prostitution, 141; and racism, 144; and slavery, 11; and slums, 158; and technology, 101; and workers, 60, 168; and working class, 30. See also financiers; social order, economic determination of
Carmichael, Stokely, 33
catharsis, 103–4
Catholicism, 128–29
Cayton, Horace, Black Metropolis, 66, 147
Certeau, Michel de, 46–48
chaos, 98–99
children, 90
cinema, 57; in Native Son, 67–69
city, 99; urban life, 26, 47. See also polis
Cleaver, Eldridge, 3, 45, 58; criticism of, 32–33; on lumpenproletariat, 29–30, 143; Marxism repurposed by, 29–33; on proletariat, 53; “ultimate revolutionary demand,” 148; Walker anticipates, 142
Cleaver, Kathleen, 3–4, 29, 34
colonial context, 28–29. See also imperialism
communism, 43–45, 106; and crime/criminality, 74–75; Depression writers drawn to, 55; and racism, 178
Communist Party, 34; and African Americans, 5–7, 9, 83–84, 112–13, 172; “Black Belt” thesis, 5–6, 108; on black folk identity, 97, 108; criticism of, 176–77; and Ellison, 96, 112; literary inadequacy of, 113–15; and lumpenproletariat, 43; and racism, 5; and Scottsboro incident, 6–7, 104; and Walker, 136–37, 171, 194n2; Workers’ Alliance, 160; and Wright, 1–2, 50, 56, 63, 172, 176–77, 186n4, 198n19; in Wright’s Native Son, 83–88
Conroy, Jack, 137
Costello, Brannon, 60
Crane, Stephen, Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, 11, 37–38
crime/criminality, 73–82; and action, 174; and blackness, 123–24; and capitalism, 157; and gender, 167; glamorization of, 164; and Jim Crow, 165; juvenile delinquency, 138, 157; and labor, 158, 169; and lumpenproletariat, 140, 176; Marx and Engels on, 138; in Native Son (Wright), 76–79, 85–88; and recognition of subjectivity, 75–80; redefined in African American folklore, 18; and revolutionary change, 73–75, 160; in Tillman and Tackhead (Ellison), 121–24
Crisis (journal), 136
Cruse, Harold, 9
Dahlberg, Edward, 12, 43, 45; Bottom Dogs, 42
Daily Worker (periodical), 117
Davis, Angela, Women, Race, and Class, 194n93
Davis, Ben, Jr., 115
Davis, Frank Marshall, 173
Dawahare, Anthony, 58, 89, 171; Nationalism, Marxism, and African American Literature between the Wars, 186n8
deconstruction, 20–21, 24, 27, 47, 92, 143. See also philosophy
desire: beyond proletarian organization, 5; and revolutionary change, 62, 121; for subjective visibility, 52, 63, 73, 78; for subjectivity, in Native Son, 63–72
diaspora, 38–39
Dickstein, Morris, 55–56
dislocation, 17
Dolinar, Brian, 5–6
domestic/domesticity, 59–60, 65, 70–71, 81–82, 88, 90, 92–93. See also labor; workers
double consciousness, 121, 163
Douglass, Frederick, and Marx, 133–34
Drake, Kimberly, 58–59, 79; Subjectivity in the American Protest Novel, 186n8
Drake, St. Clair, Black Metropolis, 66, 147
Dubey, Madhu, 151
Du Bois, W. E. B., 38, 52; Black Reconstruction, 174; The Souls of Black Folk, 52, 163
Dunbar, Paul Laurence, 158
Edmunds, Susan, 65
Edwards, Brent Hayes, 3, 38–39
Elder, Matthew, 186n8
Ellison, Ralph, 165; on chaos, 98–99; and Communist Party, 96, 112; in Dayton, 116–17; in Decatur, 104–5; on fluidity of American society, 18, 97–100; on folk, 108–9; “Harlem is Nowhere,” 16; “Hidden Name and Complex Fate,” 99; “Hymie’s Bull,” 13, 110–11; “I Did Not Learn Their Names,” 106–8, 110; and institutional critique, 111–16, 173–74; on integration, 90–91; Invisible Man, 98, 170–71, 173; on Jim Crow, 104–5; and lumpenproletarian black Marxism, 118; and lumpenproletariat, 2, 94–97, 103, 105–6, 125–26, 174; and Marxism, 10, 12–13, 96–97, 99, 102–3, 105, 108, 110, 132, 135, 171, 173–74; “A Party Down at the Square,” 102, 104; and possibility, 135; psychological interest of, 16, 130; “Remembering Richard Wright” (lecture), 1, 13; Shadow and Act, 99; trip from Oklahoma to Tuskegee, 96–97, 99–101, 111; “Twentieth-Century Fiction and the Black Mask of Humanity,” 10; and Walker, 14; “The World and the Jug,” 182n29; on Wright, 1, 13, 170; and Wright, 12–13, 113, 117; on Wright’s Native Son, 13, 114–16
—Slick, 4, 18, 97, 104, 125–35; Douglass and Marx in, 133–34; hunting in, 132–34; resembles Native Son, 117, 126; writing of, 116–17
—“Slick Gonna Learn,” 125; on technology, 101–3, 127
—Tillman and Tackhead, 4, 13, 18, 97, 116–25; painting slashed in, 121–22; person slashed in, 123–24; writing of, 116–17
Engels, Friedrich: and Black Panther Party, 33–34; The Communist Manifesto, 22–24, 31, 40–41, 45; on criminality, 138; on lumpenproletariat, 2, 21–28, 41, 50, 141; The Peasant War in Germany, 22
Entin, Joseph, 189n77
equality, 32
Evans, Walker, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, 35
everyday tactic, 46–48
existentialism, 72, 98, 176; and Marxism, 72
Fabre, Michel, The Unfinished Quest of Richard Wright, 186n4, 188n64
Fanon, Frantz, 3, 28–29, 31; on lumpenproletariat, 29; Marx revised by, 29; The Wretched of the Earth, 28
Favor, J. Martin, 108
feminization, tropes of, 89
Ferguson (Missouri), uprising in, 19
financiers, 23–24
fluidity, 97–100, 110, 120; and lumpenproletariat, 125; and overdetermination, 101
Foley, Barbara, 6, 43, 92, 96, 98, 131, 171, 173; Radical Representations, 40; Wrestling with the Left: The Making of Ralph Ellison’s “Invisible Man,” 10, 190n5
folk, 103, 108–11, 120; ballads, 138–40; black folk, 5, 34, 97, 108–9, 111, 113, 139–40, 160, 164–65, 169; lumpen-folk, 18, 97, 110–11. See also Du Bois, W. E. B.
Fouché, Rayvon, 102
free indirect discourse, 155
freight trains. See trains
French Revolution, 70–71
Freud, Sigmund, 16
gangsters, vs. workers, 60
gender: and crime/criminality, 167; in Walker, 141, 148, 154, 167; in Wright, 53–54, 59, 81, 88–90, 92–93. See also intersectionality; masculinity; patriarchy; prostitution; women
George, Stephen, 186n8
Gibson, Donald, 52
Gilroy, Paul, 46
Gilyard, Keith, 167
Gold, Mike, 51; Jews Without Money, 41–42
Goose Island (Chicago, IL), 15, 153–60. See also Walker, Margaret
Gorky, Maxim, 62
Gorz, André, 145
Gramsci, Antonio, 15, 98, 103, 105, 110, 112, 131
Great Migration, 56, 71, 108, 161
Griffiths, Frederick T., 190n5
Guttman, Sandra, 84
Hall, Stuart, 105; Policing the Crisis: Mugging, the State, and Law and Order, 46
happiness, 70–71
Hardt, Michael, 2
Harlem Renaissance, 11, 38, 109
Harris, Trudier, 89
Hayes, Peter, 23
Henry, John, 140, 144, 163, 167–68
Himmelfarb, Gertrude, 23
history, 82
hobos, 13, 45–47, 60, 104–5; as archetypal figure of lumpenproletariat, 7
Hobson, Christopher Z., 190n5
Homer, Winslow: and African Americans, 119; The Gulf Stream, 118–25, 129
Honig, Bonnie, 90–91
housing, 82
Howe, Irving, “Black Boys and Native Sons,” 172
Huckleberry Finn, 10–11, 36–38; as lumpenproletariat, 36; and rags, 36–37
Hugo, Victor, Les Misérables, 145
Hyman, Stanley Edgar, 94–95
identity: black folk, 97, 108–9; and recognition, 64, 77; transnational, 39; Wright challenges Marxist sense of, 52–53. See also recognition; subjectivity
imperialism, 38–39, 62–63, 108. See also colonial context
institutional critique, 111–16, 173–74; literary inadequacy, 114
integration, 90–91
intellectuals, 112
internationalism, 5–6, 11, 38–39, 42, 113, 133
interpellation, negative, 67
intersectionality, 7, 17–18, 40, 45, 53–54, 139, 149, 162. See also domestic/domesticity; gender; prostitution; women
Jackson, Lawrence, 5, 12, 170–71
James, C. L. R., 16
James, William, The Principles of Psychology, 66
Jameson, Fredric, 15, 51, 72, 82–83, 88
JanMohamed, Abdul, 78, 80; The Death-Bound Subject: Richard Wright’s Archaeology of Death, 186n8
Jennings, Michael, 36
Jim Crow, 18, 107; and capitalism, 62, 102, 104–5, 120, 126–28, 135; and crime/criminality, 165; and desire for revolutionary change, 121; Ellison on, 104–5; and The Gulf Stream (Homer), 119–25; and Marxism, 8; and masculinity, 55; Oklahoma City, 99; and overdetermination, 102; and social order, 105; in Tillman and Tackhead (Ellison), 119–25; and transience, 54, 56; and working class, 176
juvenile delinquency, 138, 153–54, 156–57
Kafka, Franz, 16
Karageorgos, Konstantina M., 188n64
Kelley, Robin D. G., 6
Kierkegaard, Soren, 16
Killens, John Oliver, A Man Ain’t Nothing But a Man, 167
Kobrin, Solomon, 153
labor, 32, 57, 59; and African Americans, 161, 168; Arendt on, 69–70, 90–91; and black culture, 161; and capitalism, 84; and crime, 158, 169; Huckleberry Finn avoids, 36; and John Henry, 168; and lumpenproletariat, 48, 145–46, 158; Marx on, 142; and Marxism, 46, 83–84; in Native Son, 64–65; postal work, 58; and prostitution, 146, 150; transatlantic blacks don’t see emancipation in, 46. See also domestic/domesticity; prostitution; workers; working class
leadership, 111–14, 134; literary inadequacy of, 114
Lennon, John, 7–8
Levine, Lawrence, 11
literary analysis, 26–27
literature: African American, 17, 49–51, 170; and black culture, 48; bottom dogs fiction, 12, 40, 42–45, 55, 107; free indirect discourse, 155; literary inadequacy, 114; proletarian, 40–43, 57. See also names of individual authors
Long, Huey, 44
Louis, Joe, 109–10, 113, 126, 131
Lucy, Robin, 108–9
Lukács, Georg, 174; The Historical Novel, 16
lumpenproletariat: and African Americans, 3, 48, 163; against every organized structure in the world, 32; Bigger Thomas (Native Son) as archetype of, 17, 49–51; and black culture, 48; and black Marxism, 10; and Black Panther Party, 3–4, 9, 17, 20, 28–34; and capitalism, 175; Cleaver on, 29–30, 143; and crime/criminality, 140, 176; as de-classed, 94–95; definition of, 2, 21; and Ellison, 2, 94–97, 103, 105–6, 125–26, 174; Fanon on, 29; and fluidity, 125; focus on, 12; hobo as archetypal figure of, 7; and labor, 48, 145–46, 158; Marx and Engels on, 2, 21–28, 41–42, 50, 52, 60, 63, 75, 83–84, 95, 105, 138, 141, 148–49, 153–55, 163, 169, 175, 183n16; and Marxism, 2–3, 7–8, 17–18, 20, 27–28, 33, 40, 43, 138; misery, 156; and potential, 40; as precursor to post-class society, 32, 107; and proletariat, 21–23, 26, 30–31, 53, 57, 80–82, 142, 144–45, 168; and raggedness, 35, 40; rags as figures of, 17; resistance to revisions of, 32–33; and revolutionary change, 33, 46, 50, 55–56, 62, 105–7, 138, 173, 178–79; in Slick (Ellison), 132–33; in Tillman and Tackhead (Ellison), 121; and transience, 54–56; vagabondage, 39; and Walker, 2, 18, 54, 138–40, 142–45, 142–46, 142–47, 149–50, 149–51, 158, 160, 167; and women, 11, 54, 139; and Wright, 1, 14, 17, 52–53, 56–57, 61, 63, 80–82; writing about, 45. See also black lumpenproletariat; proletariat
lynching, 8
Malraux, André, 16
marginality, 35; and African Americans, 47; and black lumpenproletariat, 52; and potential, 38; and raggedness, 35, 37, 40; and revolutionary change, 53, 57, 139, 178; and Wright, 177. See also social order; society
Marx, Karl: and Algren, 44–45; and Black Panther Party, 33–34; Capital, 26, 142; The Class Struggles in France, 49; The Communist Manifesto, 22–24, 31, 40–41, 45; A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, 103; on criminality, 138; and Douglass, 133–34; Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, 27, 141, 149; The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, 25, 31, 95, 133–34, 154; Fanon revises, 29; “first as tragedy, then as farce,” 133; “gens sans feu,” 24–25, 29, 49; The German Ideology, 73; on labor, 142; on lumpenproletariat, 2, 21–28, 41–42, 50, 52, 60, 63, 75, 83–84, 95, 105, 138, 141, 148–49, 153–55, 163, 169, 175, 183n16; on prostitution, 141–42; on revolution of 1848, 22, 27; on urban life, 26
Marxism: and African American literature, 170; and African Americans, 1–2, 4, 9, 19, 33, 52, 95, 117, 138, 170–72; and Black Panther Party, 4, 17, 28, 34, 178; Cleaver repurposes, 29–33; deconstruction of, 20–21, 27; and desire for recognition, 72; and Ellison, 10, 12–13, 96–97, 99, 102–3, 105, 108, 110, 132, 135, 171, 173–74; and existentialism, 72; and Jim Crow, 8; and labor, 46, 83–84; limitations of, 26–28; and lumpenproletariat, 2–3, 7–8, 17–18, 20, 27–28, 33, 40, 43, 138; Native Son on, 114; objective/subjective determinations of, 82, 88; and proletariat, 145; revisionary, 2, 9, 17, 20, 29–34, 50–52, 57, 97, 109, 125, 134, 138–41, 143, 145, 169, 178–79; and subjectivity, 114; on wages, 167; and Walker, 10, 14–15, 136–38, 143; and Wright, 10, 12–14, 17, 49–52, 172–73. See also black Marxism
masculinity, 48, 54–55, 59–60, 76, 89; black, 54–55, 76, 123; and Jim Crow, 55
mass culture, 56, 60, 62, 69, 71, 74
masses, 112–13
Maxwell, William, 9, 39, 45, 50, 190n5
McKay, Claude: Banjo, 11, 38–39; Home to Harlem, 38
Mills, Nathaniel, 197n11
Minus, Marian, 109, 111, 117; “Present Trends in Negro Literature,” 109
mobility/transience, 54–56; and lumpenproletariat, 56; and revolutionary change, 55, 106
Montag, Warren, 67
Mootry, Maria, 89
Morgan, J. P., 66
movies, 57; in Native Son, 67–69
Munford, C. J., 32
Napoléon III, emperor of France, 22, 25
National Negro Conference, 112–13, 143
nationalism, 5–6, 9, 39, 58, 89, 108–9, 126, 171–72, 174; and capitalism, 58; and racism, 58
Neal, Larry, 96
Negri, Antonio, 2
Negro Quarterly (journal), 94
The New Anvil (magazine), 136–37, 151
New Challenge (journal), 137
New Masses (magazine), 51, 109, 112, 114, 117
Nicholls, David G., 108
Non-Aligned Movement, 178
Norman, Dorothy, 188n64
Norton, Anne, 91
Occupy Wall Street, 19
Ogbar, Jeffrey O. G., 33
Ongiri, Amy, 3
outlaw. See crime/criminality
overdetermination, 100–102; and fluidity, 101; and Jim Crow, 102; and possibility, 101
paper: and African Americans, 39; and rags, 17, 35–36, 35–37, 39–40, 44, 151, 157
permanent revolution, 61
philosophy, 15–16, 198n19; deconstruction, 20–21, 24, 27, 47, 92, 143; knowledge and truth, 34; Native Son as philosophical novel, 114. See also identity; possibility; potential; subjectivity
poet, 36
polis, 70–73, 77, 84, 88, 91, 93
Political Affairs (journal), 32
political economy, 27
politics, 90–91
possibility: and Ellison, 135; and overdetermination, 101; and raggedness, 37–38, 44
postal work, 58
potential: and lumpenproletariat, 40; and marginality, 38
proletariat, 40–41; Cleaver on, 53; literature, 40–43, 57; and lumpenproletariat, 21–23, 26, 30–31, 53, 57, 80–82, 142, 144–45, 168; and Marxism, 145; ragged, 35, 49, 174; revolution, 141; Walker on, 143–45; Wright on, 60
prostitution, 23, 37, 42, 141–43, 146–47, 149–51; and labor, 146, 150
race, Hall on, 105
racial divisions, 28–31, 33, 45, 58; and double consciousness, 121; and subjective in/visibility, 52; and subjectivity, 68
racism: and capitalism, 144; and communism, 178; and Communist Party, 5; and nationalism, 58; sterilization, 193n93; subjectivity of blackness/whiteness, 66–67; and trains, 107; and working class movement, 6. See also colonial context; Jim Crow; recognition; subjectivity
ragged, 26
ragged proletariat, 35, 49, 174
raggedness, 17; and lumpenproletariat, 35, 40; and marginality, 35, 37, 40; and possibility, 37–38, 44
rags: and Huckleberry Finn, 36–37; and paper, 17, 35–36, 35–37, 39–40, 44, 151, 157; and revolutionary change, 152; in Tillman and Tackhead (Ellison), 122; in Walker, 151–52, 156–57
ragtime music, 48
Rampersad, Arnold, 98, 111, 117
Rancière, Jacques, 28
rap music, 47
rape, 79; and recognition, 79–80
reality, challenge apparent forms of, 98
recognition: and crime/criminality, 75–80; desire for, 63, 66; and identity, 64, 77; in Native Son, 85–87; nothing worse than being completely unnoticed, 66; and rape, 79–80; as revolutionary change, 63, 69, 72–73, 77, 84; and society, 78. See also identity; marginality; subjectivity
revolutionary change: and African Americans, 3–4, 6, 33–34, 84, 169; American Revolution, 70–71, 87; and black lumpenproletariat, 30–31, 53; and bureaucratization, 112–13; and crime/criminality, 73–75, 160; and desire, 62, 121; French Revolution, 70–71; and lumpenproletariat, 33, 46, 50, 55–56, 62, 105–7, 138, 173, 178–79; and marginality, 53, 57, 139, 178; and Native Son, 17, 51–52; origination of, 62; and overdetermination of social order, 100–102; permanent revolution, 61; philosophical background of, 15–16; and rags, 152; recognition of subjectivity as, 63, 69, 72–73, 77, 84; reconceived as outsider tactic, 12; Russian Revolution, 71; Soviet-style, 56–57, 61; and subjectivity, 51; and transience/mobility, 55, 106; ultimate demand of, 32; vanguard of, 3, 8, 12, 30, 32–33, 57; Walker on, 138, 162; and Wright, 53–57, 61
Rich, Adrienne, 90
Rideout, Walter, 42; The Radical Novel in the United States, 40
Rollins, William, The Shadow Before, 41
Rowley, Hazel, 13, 53–54, 57; Richard Wright: The Life and Times, 186n4, 188n64
Russian Revolution, 71; Soviet-style revolution, 56–57, 61
Sartre, Jean-Paul, 15–16, 51, 72, 74, 76, 83, 188n64; Search for a Method, 72
school integration, 90
Scott, William, 165
Scottsboro case, 6–9, 61, 72, 104, 107, 110; and Communist Party, 6–7
Seale, Bobby, 33–34
Shaw, Clifford, 153; The Jack-roller, 153
Sheldon, William H., Psychology and the Promethean Will, 16, 130
Sillen, Samuel, 51
slavery, 87; and capitalism, 11; and imperialism, 39
slums, and capitalism, 158
Smethurst, James, 50
social order: African Americans outside of, 3–4; and crime/criminality, 74–75; economic determination of, 98, 103; Huckleberry Finn refuses, 10–11, 36–37; and Jim Crow, 105; overdetermination of, and revolutionary change, 100–102; and technology, 102. See also marginality
society: and Bigger Thomas (Native Son), 51; Ellison on fluidity of, 18, 97–100; lumpenproletariat as precursor to post-class, 32, 107; and recognition, 78; those who fall out of, 21, 23, 27, 31, 46, 50, 125. See also marginality
Soviet-style revolution, 56–57, 61; Russian Revolution, 71
Spassky, Natalie, 193n69
Stagolee, 11, 33, 47–48, 140, 164–69; as early antihero, 140
Stallybrass, Peter, 25, 28, 145, 183n16
sterilization, 193n93
subjectivity: Althusser on, 67; and blackness/whiteness, 66–68; and crime/criminality, 75–80; desire for, in Native Son, 63–72, 186n8; Ellison on lumpenproletarian, 105; and in/visibility of black subject, 52, 63; and Marxism, 114; Native Son as portrait of lumpenproletarian, 50; and racial divisions, 68; and revolutionary change, 51. See also identity; recognition
Sunday Worker (periodical), 115
Sutton, Frank, 117
technology, 101–3, 127; and African Americans, 102
Third World, 178
Thoburn, Nicholas, 52–53
Thompson, Louise, 8
Tolentino, Cynthia, 187n8
Trader Horn (film), 67–69
trains, 6, 13, 45–47, 46–47, 54–56, 97, 104, 106–7, 110–11, 125, 165; and racism, 107; revolutionary implications of, 106
transience/mobility, 54–56; and lumpenproletariat, 56; and revolutionary change, 55, 106
truth, 34
Tuhkanen, Mikko, 83
Twain, Mark: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, 37; The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, 36–37; Huckleberry Finn, 10–11, 36–38
urban life, 26, 47; city, 99. See also polis
Vincent, Ricky, 181n7
Wald, Alan, Exiles from a Future Time: The Forging of the Mid-Twentieth-Century Literary Left, 182n32, 194nn2–3
Walker, Margaret, 1, 12, 136–69; “Bad-Man Stagolee,” 164–66; “Big John Henry,” 167–68; and Communist Party, 136–37, 171, 194n2; and Ellison, 14; “Factory-hand,” 143, 148; folk ballads, 138–40; For My People, 4, 10, 18, 140, 149, 157, 160, 162, 165, 167–68; gender in, 141, 148, 154, 167; Goose Island, 5, 14, 18, 138–39, 153–60, 164, 174, 176; “Gun Moll,” 145–50; Jubilee, 16, 174–76; “Kissie Lee,” 166–67; “Lineage,” 162, 166–67; and Lukács, 16; and lumpenproletariat, 2, 18, 54, 138–40, 142–47, 149–51, 158, 160, 167; and Marxism, 10, 14–15, 136–40, 143; “Men At Work,” 144–45; “Molly Means,” 163–64; on proletariat, 143–45; “Prostitute,” 150; prostitution in, 141–43, 146–47, 149–51; “Radical Revolutionary,” 138–39; on rags, 151–52, 156–57; “The Red Satin Dress,” 136, 151–52; on revolutionary change, 138, 162; “Rich Fokes Worl,” 144, 148; “Two-Gun Buster and Trigger Slim,” 168; “Whores,” 149; on women, 18, 146–47, 149, 162; on working class, 143, 148, 151; and Wright, 13–14, 137–38, 143
Weatherwax, Clara, Marching! Marching!, 41
welfare, 31
Wertham, Fredric, 16
white supremacy, 44–45, 54, 99, 102
white trash, 8
Williams, Raymond, 108
Winston, Henry, 32
Wolfe, Jesse, 97
women, 7–8, 38; in Arendt, 90; and lumpenproletariat, 11, 54, 139; undercover as male hobos, 104; Walker on, 18, 146–47, 149, 162; in Wright, 59, 88–89, 92–93. See also gender; intersectionality; prostitution
Wood, Peter H., 119
work. See labor
workers, 7–8, 27, 32; and capitalism, 60, 168; vs. gangsters, 60; and prostitution, 141
working class, 30–31; African Americans, 53; and Jim Crow, 176; and proletariat literature, 40; and racism, 6; in Walker, 143, 148, 151; in Wright, 59–60, 64, 81
Wright, John S., 101–2
Wright, Richard, 137; “Almos’ a Man,” 55; anticipates Black Panthers, 53; “Big Boy Leaves Home,” 54; Black Hope, 92–93, 146; “Blueprint for Negro Writing,” 109; in Chicago, 1, 62; The Color Curtain: A Report on the Bandung Conference, 178; and Communist Party, 1–2, 50, 56, 63, 172, 176–77, 186n4, 198n19; crime/criminality in, 73–82, 87–88; domesticity in, 59–60, 65, 70–71, 81–82, 88, 90, 92–93; and Ellison, 12–13, 113; Ellison on, 170; and Ellison, rift with, 117; and folk, 108–9; gender in, 53–54, 59, 81, 85, 88–90, 92–93; “How ‘Bigger’ Was Born,” 49, 61, 63, 114; “Joe Louis Uncovers Dynamite,” 109–10, 126; Lawd, Today!, 4, 53, 57–62, 81, 89, 126, 144, 172; and lumpenproletarian black Marxism, 118; and lumpenproletariat, 1, 14, 17, 52–53, 56–57, 61, 63, 80–82; and marginality, 177; and Marxism, 10, 12–14, 17, 49–52, 172–73; 12 Million Black Voices, 56, 71
—Native Son, 4, 49–53, 59, 63–67, 70–73, 89, 126, 130, 144, 160, 176–77; Baldwin on, 172; Bigger Thomas as lumpenproletarian, 17, 49–51; and capitalism, 51–52; communism in, 83–88; desire for subjectivity, 63–72; Ellison on, 13, 114–16; Marx clouds reading of, 50–51; movie scene, 67–69; murder in, 76–79, 85–88; and pulp fiction, 189n77; rape in, 79; recognition in, 85–87; reviews of, 51, 114–16; and revolutionary change, 17, 51–52; Walker influence on, 14
—The Outsider, 176–77; patriarchal tendencies of, 53; and philosophy, 16; on proletariat, 60; and revolutionary change, 53–57, 61; “Transcontinental,” 4, 56–57, 62; and Walker, friendship, 13–14, 137–38, 143; women in, 59, 88–89, 92–93; on working class, 59–60, 64, 81
—Writing Red (anthology), 136
Yaeger, Patricia, 35