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Repetition and Value in Richard Wright’s Man Who Lived Underground

Publication ,  Journal Article
Jones, DA
Published in: American Literature
March 1, 2023

This essay considers how Richard Wright’s newly released novel, The Man Who Lived Underground (2021), offers a profound black existentialist rumination on suffering, alienation, pleasure, and aesthetic experience. Homing in on the novel’s use of figures of repetition and queries of the ontology of value, it reads how Wright makes way for modes of thought that, while scorned by normative aims and logics, produce new perspectives, habits, and, perhaps, avenues for individual fulfilment in an otherwise absurd world hostile to black life and personhood.

Duke Scholars

Published In

American Literature

DOI

EISSN

1527-2117

ISSN

0002-9831

Publication Date

March 1, 2023

Volume

95

Issue

1

Start / End Page

123 / 134

Related Subject Headings

  • Literary Studies
  • 4705 Literary studies
  • 2005 Literary Studies
 

Citation

APA
Chicago
ICMJE
MLA
NLM
Jones, D. A. (2023). Repetition and Value in Richard Wright’s Man Who Lived Underground. American Literature, 95(1), 123–134. https://doi.org/10.1215/00029831-10345407
Jones, D. A. “Repetition and Value in Richard Wright’s Man Who Lived Underground.” American Literature 95, no. 1 (March 1, 2023): 123–34. https://doi.org/10.1215/00029831-10345407.
Jones DA. Repetition and Value in Richard Wright’s Man Who Lived Underground. American Literature. 2023 Mar 1;95(1):123–34.
Jones, D. A. “Repetition and Value in Richard Wright’s Man Who Lived Underground.” American Literature, vol. 95, no. 1, Mar. 2023, pp. 123–34. Scopus, doi:10.1215/00029831-10345407.
Jones DA. Repetition and Value in Richard Wright’s Man Who Lived Underground. American Literature. 2023 Mar 1;95(1):123–134.
Journal cover image

Published In

American Literature

DOI

EISSN

1527-2117

ISSN

0002-9831

Publication Date

March 1, 2023

Volume

95

Issue

1

Start / End Page

123 / 134

Related Subject Headings

  • Literary Studies
  • 4705 Literary studies
  • 2005 Literary Studies