Grant Wiggins A Lesson Before Dying

A Lesson Before Dying

Thesis: Grant Wiggins’ decision to move back to the quarter after living in California is the single event that had the heaviest impact on his identity.

Body: Grant’s personal and professional relationships influence him in a unique aspect. With every relationship Grant learns something new about himself. When putting this into perspective, the influencers surrounding Grant allows for new developments and depth within the evolution of his personal identity. His neighbor to the left may teach him the importance of belief in a higher power, while a classroom of students may teach him patience. Jefferson impacts Grant’s life in a magnitude he could not even comprehend by transforming the unfortunate situation at hand

“I need you much more than you could ever need me. You-you can be bigger than anyone you have ever met” (Gaines 193). Here, Grant proclaims to Jefferson that despite how worthless he may feel as days go by in his cell, Jefferson is the one man that is revolutionizing the community and is in the position to break the vicious cycle. Along with Jefferson, Grant’s identity is transformed by his girlfriend, Vivian Baptiste. Vivian is the only person in Grant’s life that can convince him to persevere through his struggles when constantly tempted with urges to drop everything and run away. She is Grant’s support system that provides constant encouragement when he is trapped in a problematic situation. She instills confidence in him and confirms that he is making a difference in the lives of his students, Jefferson, and the overall community. During a conversation shared between Grant and Vivian, Grant is at a low and vents his feelings to Vivian; crying, “I'm not doing any good up there, Vivian,” I said. “Nothing's changing”. “Something is,” she said (Gaines 141). If Grant did not have Vivian, he may have not learned the importance of persistence and dedication needed within

As a black man himself, Grant endures the cruel yet ignored societal standard on the daily. Grant and the community have been brainwashed to believe in racist acts as an acceptable behavior. He learns from racist behaviors early in the beginning of the novel when the injustices are displayed at Jefferson's trial. The prosecutor in the trial spoke with a ruthless, inhumane tone with intentions to humiliate and dehumanize Jefferson. In attempt to make a case, the prosecutor asks the jury if they truly see a man that is capable of planning when looking at Jefferson and carries on with, “No, gentlemen, this skull here holds no plans. What you see here is a thing that acts on command. A thing to hold the handle of a plow, a thing to load your bales of cotton, a thing to dig your ditches, to chop your wood, to pull your corn. That is what you see here, but you do not see anything capable of planning a robbery or a murder. He does not even know the size of his clothes or his shoes” (Gaines 8). As the prosecutor refers to Jefferson as a “thing”, it is clear that respecting the colored people is of his least concern. As a colored man alike Jefferson, this makes Grant feel as worthless and inconsequential as the prosecutor is describes Jefferson to be. The merciless terms used by white people speaking of the colored are loosely thrown around so the black people learn to accept the labels