Prologue - Chapter 2
One things that is very interesting in these chapters is the treatment the narrator gives to the white men, when they treat him so badly. This really stood out in the part in the chapter one where he is with his grandfather, who is on his deathbed. His grandfather is ashamed of himself for having been quiet. This sticks with the narrator, as he too lives a quiet and meek life. The grandfather also described the lives of black Americans as a warfare. So when it mentions that all the white men complimented the narrator on his quiet life, it shows that they do not want to have to fight with the narrator. They are praising him for keeping quiet about his social rights, the battle that they always want to put off. That is the very problem we are dealing with in this book. During those times, many white men did not want to deal with the issue of racism, and would do anything to put it off or to appease for the time being, without actually solving the issue. They wanted to discriminate against a race, and not have any repercussions, which is impossible. Even in the book, the narrator seems to be a calm, even headed man, however, even he reaches a limit and when it is passed, he attacks a man, almost killing him. The problem is, that these actions only provided the ability to twist and corrupt the truth by blaming the black man, when the white man was really the cause of it. Do you think that we will see more evidence of this later in the book? Also, do you think the narrator's attitude will begin to shift throughout the book, will he begin to become less quiet?
