Racism, Diversity and Economic Struggles: A Literary Analysis

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Within the course of two decades these three novels deal with racism, diversity of people and similar economic status. The writers raise awareness of the oppression of the African American communities and the long lasting struggles that these folks had to endure to survive.
At the time when the country was healing from the wounds of World War II and entering the birth of the civil rights movement, Walter introduces us to ‘Easy’ Rawlins. Easy is a working middle class African American who battles society’s racism and prejudice throughout the course of the novel. He loses his job at Champion aircraft company, and faces the fear of losing the “American Dream.” The author grants the reader a sense of pride when Easy accomplishes what few African …show more content…

Human nature would dictate two different outcomes in this book: depression, and determination. Conversely, in A Lesson Before Dying, Human nature points to loyalty that Grant has towards his aunt that raised him. Responsibility is an evident theme that presents itself in all three literary works. In Devil in a Blue Dress, Easy has the responsibility to be an upright citizen because he has a mortgage and bills to pay. “I loved going home. Maybe it was that I was raised on a sharecropper’s farm or that I never owned anything until I bought that house, but I loved my little home” (Mosley 56). This illustrates that Easy would sacrifice everything he had to keep his house, which represents the symbol of freedom he accomplished from hard work. Likewise, in A Lesson Before Dying, Grant felt responsibility to support Jefferson. He felt that it was his duty to obey his aunt to help Jefferson through the coming days of his execution. “I clamped my jaws so tight the veins in my neck felt they would burst… I had told her I was no teacher, I hated teaching, and I was just running in place here” (Gaines 15). Aunt Tante Lou possesses a power over Grant, to persuade him to

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