Native Son is so fucking good, Richard Wright is such a fucking genius. My mind is fucking blown. I had a lot of questions concerning Richard Wright's interpretation of American life when I first read Black Boy and Native Son, but living in America this whole time since then has made me understand: this dude knew the psychology of it all cold, and he fucking told it straight, simple, and true. Genius. James Baldwin style. Oh! That's it. I read James Baldwin, and now I understand Richard Wright better. But could I have understood James Baldwin, felt him and reveled in his brilliance as I did, if I had not first read, and been troubled by, Richard Wright? Who knows! All I know is I am damn glad I have both their books around. The most basic fact and most important takeaway is that they are two of the most talented craftsmen in their field, ever, period. Those mothers knew how to fucking write.
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If you have read Crime and Punishment and not Native Son, I challenge you in no uncertain terms: you oughta catch up.
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I think--almost sure--that I will read Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain now. Could go a different way but that is what is currently in my mind.
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People who pretend to read, people who pretend to watch--see--and people who pretend to think, are capable of believing themselves brilliant, astute, correct, qualified, any number of fine adjectives that suit their vanity and ease their consciences.
In truth, these nonentities merely serve as nodes on a memetic string they dance upon and propagate but do not comprehend.
There is no stopping a meme--their power is too great, the willing nodes too numerous--but you don't have to believe them. You, personally, the brain that thinks. How memes might force you to respond to them is another matter, but your mind is always free to understand more deeply than a meme, to think and doubt and believe more freely than you are free to act--if you are able to muster the courage, the humility, and the faith in your own selfhood that this freedom requires.
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SMOKE WEED EVERY DAAAAAAAAY
--JL
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