ABSTRACT
Since the publication of Black Boy in 1945, reactions to its authenticity have been curiously contradictory, often mutually exclusive. For many readers the book is particularly honest, sincere, open, convincing and accurate. But for others Black Boy leaves a feeling of inauthenticity, a sense that the story or its author is not to be trusted. These conflicting reactions are best illustrated by the following representative observations by Ralph White and W.E.B.DuBois. White, a psychologist, identified “ruthless honesty” as “the outstanding quality which made the book not only moving but also intellectually satisfying.” 1 But DuBois noted that while “nothing that Richard Wright says is in itself unbelievable or impossible; it is the total picture that is not convincing.” 2 Attempting to reconcile these opposing views, I wish to argue that both sides are correct, that the book is one of the most truthful accounts of the black experience in America, even though the protagonist's story often does not ring true, and that this inability to tell the truth is Wright's major metaphor of self. A repeated pattern of misrepresentation becomes the author's way of making us believe that his personality, his family, his race—his whole childhood and youth—conspired to prevent him from hearing the truth, speaking the truth, or even being believed unless he lied.
