Reinventing the Black Hero in the Fiction of Walter Mosley

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Transcript of Reinventing the Black Hero in the Fiction of Walter Mosley

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7einventing the 4lack :ero in the 8iction of Balter 0osley

5atherine 6� 0elly

6ubmitted to the faculty of the :niversity 9raduate 6chool

in partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree

0aster of 3rts in 7nglish

in the 5ollege of 1iberal 3rts and 6ciences

;ndiana :niversity

6eptember ����

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3ccepted by the 9raduate 8aculty� ;ndiana :niversity�

in partial fulfillment of the requirements for

the degree of0aster of 3rts in 7nglish�

6irector

0�3� 5ommittee

<J_~u_Q__~ 6eptember ���� 7laine 7oth� 3h�6�

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6edication

In memory of3rofessor 7ileen 4ender� 3h�6� whose love of literature

fundamentally inspired this project�

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3cknowledgements

; would like to acknowledge the members of my committee� 1ee 0ahan� 3h�6��

-ake 0attox� 3h�6�� and 7laine 7oth� 3h�6� whose assistance with this project was

greatly appreciated�

;n addition� ; would like to thank 0arcy :olland� 03� who supplied her

exceptional grammar and proofreading skills�

8inally� ; would like to express my deep gratitude and love for my mother

5onstance 3kins who provided a wonderful example of how to overcome life's extreme

obstacles with grace and excellence�

;9

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3frican�3mericans have historically struggled with maintaining an authentic

4lack 3frican identity that has not been suppressed or white washed to meet the demands

of a dominant white society� 9his struggle has overlapped into the 3frican�3merican

literary tradition� where authenticity is always a matter of debate� 9he question

authenticity most notably arises concerning genre mimicry or ethnic expansion of white

literary traditions� 6ouble 5onsciousness is a term describing the paradox of 3merican

racial identity articulated by B�7�4� 6u 4ois in The SRqOo Rf%OacN DRON. ;n a famous

passage from the opening chapter� "4f 4ur 6piritual 6trivings�" 6u 4ois represents

3frican�3mericans as a people who are ever seeing themselves

through the eyes of others� of measuring one's soul by the tape of

a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity� 4ne ever feels

his two�ness� �� an 3merican� a 3egro- two souls� two thoughts� two

unreconciled strivings- two warring ideals in one dark body� (6ubois ��)

6u 4ois was the first black intellectual to voice the internal struggle of a black man to be

true to his own inner humanity while being forced to meet the false stereotypic

expectations of a segregated post�reconstruction culture� 6u 4ois argues that it is the

negative reflection the black man sees of himself in the eyes of white 3merica that causes

him to divide himself into separate personas that are constantly at odds with one another�

;n order to be accepted or to avoid oppression� he must conceal his assertive and more

forceful nature� while only sharing the mild and apparently meeker traits that he perceives

the white community will accept�

6everal decades after 6u 4ois� the 3frican�3merican literary tradition takes

double consciousness a step further by severing what is perceived as the black man's

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intellectual and violent self into two separate personas� 3lthough the original 6uboisian

theory relates to the autonomous black identity and the identity adapted to appease a

dominant white culture� it is not too far a leap to see how the continuous shift from an

assertive black identity within the 3frican�3merican community and the skillfully

calculated identity to navigate the white community creates an evolution of 6ubois'

theory� in which the aggressive and intellectual black identities completely sever and are

portrayed by two distinct personas� 9he black male protagonist is no longer one

individual who must suppress intellectual or violent aspects of his temperament based on

his environment- he becomes two distinct individuals� 9he severing of these personas is

seen in the works of renowned 3frican�3merican authors 7alph 7llison and 7ichard

Bright� who each create a central 3frican�3merican character that embodies only one

facet of the dual identity within the black male in 3merican literature� ;n GQrioibOe KaQ,

7llison creates an intellectual black male character who is ever questioning his identity

and his role as a subjugated member of 3merican society� :e is a thinking man who

primarily believes that he can elevate his social status in 3merica by using education and

intellect as a means of self�promotion� :owever� he quickly discovers that mainstream

white 3merica may feign acceptance of the intellectual� but usury is typically afoot and

there is no place in black 3merica for a black male who is entirely intellectual� 3fter

suffering rejection on every front� ;nvisible 0an sheds his intellectual identity to take on

the 7inehart persona� in response to his failed attempt to assimilate into dominant white

culture (7llison ���)� :e eventually runs beneath the city to social obscurity� unwilling

to return to society� until he first comes to terms with his fully integrated selves� 8rom

his underground vault� he declares that the rest of society is "up there somewhere� making

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a mess of the world� Bell� let them� ; was through and� in spite of the dream� ; was

whole" (7llison ���)� 7llison's text signifies the longing for the 3frican�3merican male

to be accepted for his full identity� without sacrificing segments of his personality to

assimilate into either the black or white culture�

5ontrary to 7llison's intellectual ;nvisible 0an� in Napire SRQ, 7ichard Bright

creates a violent black male character who has little self�reflection or ability to imagine a

non�violent means of moving beyond the social suppression created by the bigotry of

mainstream white 3merica� 9he poverty and pervasive racial discrimination of urban

3merica have not given 4igger 9homas the physical or intellectual resources necessary

to escape his socioeconomic cul�de�sac- he is therefore compelled to express his anger

and frustration with violence� 1ike ;nvisible 0an� 4igger quickly learns that there is no

place in white or black 3merica for a black male who is ruled solely by intellect or by

violent aggression� :e is also rejected� and from the social isolation of prison� he begins

to develop the introspection necessary to integrate his intellectual and aggressive selves

(Bright ���)� Bright and 7llison wonderfully show the distinguishable characteristics of

the violent and the intellectual black male identities depicted in 3merican literature�

which are each at odds with segments of their society because of the one�dimensional

nature of their personalities� 7ach finds himself removed from the black community and

dominant culture and using self�reflection to help integrate his violent and intellectual

selves in an effort to find personal peace and social acceptance�

; would like to explore how this split has evolved in the more recent fiction of

Balter 0osley's work� as he provides a wonderful opportunity to explore new ground in

the old territory of double consciousness� :is writing� which features 3frican�3merican

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male protagonists� expands upon 6u 4ois' conception of double consciousness within the

3frican�3merican male identity by distinguishing the intellectual self and the violent self

as two discernible components within the black male identity� 9his division of the black

male identity in literature may be attributed to the strong hostilities 3frican�3mericans

have historically faced from a racially oppressive country� which causes a necessary

schism within his masculine identity� Bhite 3merica resists his wholeness� which

incorporates his intellectualism and his militancy- he is therefore encouraged to suppress

the more aggressive areas of his persona that he believes are the most reviled and

discriminated against in white 3merica� 5onsistent with Bright's violent male character�

4igger 9homas and 7llison's intellectual� ;nvisible 0an� 0osley has split the black male

identity of his protagonists in the 7asy 7awlins and the 8earless -ones detective series�

Bright and 7llison created one protagonist that embodied either the badman or the

intellectual persona� who drove the story alone� ;n their model� the 3frican�3merican

male is doomed to social isolation because he lacks the personality traits to be successful

in both the black and the white world� :nlike Bright and 7llison� 0osley responds to

this problem by linking the intellectual protagonist and violent sidekick together to work

in tandem to resolve the plot�

An overlap in this struggle of double consciousness is playing out among the

black male protagonists of 0osley's work� :e adapts his writing to meet the demands of

an established white literary tradition of detective novels and simultaneously attempts to

carve out new territory for 3frican�3merican writers to create their unique contribution

to this genre� 0osley uses the 6ocrates 8ortlow novel series to go outside of the

detective genre and broaden the black hero character in ways that he did not in his

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detective novels� :e takes more liberty in the way he develops his protagonist within his

contemporary novel series� allowing his hero to embody characteristics of both the

intellectual and the violent black male� 9his evolution of protagonist is consistent with

the chronological order of his detective and novel series� 9he detective series take place

in the mid�twentieth century and the 8 ortlow novel series has a contemporary ����' s

setting� 9he timing of each novel's settings and the way the characters respond to their

social environments are consistent with our own national response to the racially charged

atmosphere of the mid�twentieth century and post civil rights era�

6uestions of genre are rampant in the discourse concerning author Balter

0osley's contributions to the literary tradition of white crime and detective novels�

3lthough he is relatively new to the scene� introducing his first 7asy 7awlins detective

novel� BeriO iQ a %Oqe Bneoo in ����� there has been a great deal written about whether or

not he is mimicking the white crime story genre or whether he has carved out a new

3frican�3merican ethnic tradition in detective fiction� ;n "'9he 4lack 6ick'� 7ace�

6exuality� and 6iscourse in the 1�3� 3ovels of Balter 0osley�" 7oger 4erger questions

whether 0osley's use of black subject� character and environment are truly

transformative in the detective story formula or "are the novels merely exotic versions of

the 3merican detective story� as opposed to subversive texts1" (���) :ltimately� he

cautions 0osley of the dangers of using the genre as an entryway into publication at the

risk of having difficulty reentering the "community of black discourse" without suffering

some loss (4erger ���)� ;n relationship to this ethical quandary both writer and detective

hero face� author -ohn 9ruesser suggests in $ &RPlaQiRQ pR &niPe DicpiRQ that "3o

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matter how brilliant or brave they are� black sleuths in the pay of white clients or the

white power structure risk coming off as lackeys� In short� 3frican�3merican mystery

writers must strike a difficult balance between genre conformity and genre

subversion"(��� )� 3side from the black characters and environment� 9ruesser argues

that 0osley remains remarkably close to traditional hardboiled detective literary

conventions� :owever� he does use this medium to show how 7asy's decision to become

a detective "complicates his relationship with his friends and the black community"

(9roesser ���)� ; argue that the use of both intellectual and violent black males within

the detective novel is 0osley's response to this difficult balance between conformity and

subversion� 0osley does not mimic author 7aymond 5handler's renowned protagonist�

3hilip 0arlowe� but develops a partnership between two distinct characters to function in

the lead detective role� 9his duel protagonist responds to the expectations of the crime

novel reader and the racially charged social environments within 0osley's texts� 9he

intellectual black hero addresses the desires of both mainstream detective novel readers

and the white power structure within each novel's setting� as the intellectual is a non�

threatening� well�assimilated black hero� 1ikewise� the violent black male prototype

responds to the widely accepted and respected black hero among black readers and within

the black community of each novel� 0osley's use of these two figures speaks directly to

the social conditions within a pre�civil�rights�era 3merica that consistently suppressed

the assertive black identity and demanded a seemingly passive black population� who

quickly perceived the needs of the white community and changed their actions and

demeanor to pacify the ruling class� It was only within the confines of the black

community that blacks could freely display their more volatile and aggressive

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characteristics� 4ver time� violent qualities became more highly respected than

intellectualism within the black community� and the intellectual was almost synonymous

with the kowtower or yes�man (Best ����� )�

Bhile some have suggested that there are ways in which the 7asy 7awlins

character can be evaluated in terms of6u 4ois' theory of6ouble 5onsciousness� there

has been no review of how or why 0osley uses the characters of 7asy 7awlins and

0ouse 3lexander to act in unison� to pursue the goals of a single protagonist�• -ust as

7llison and Bright's protagonists were moving toward social reconciliation of their one�

dimensional intellectual and violent black male characters� 0osley' s use of these

prototypes within his detective series is satisfying the need of the character and the reader

to have a multidimensional protagonist� Bhile 7asy and 0ouse are clearly two separate

individuals� 0osley has inextricably linked these two characters together to function as a

combined black hero that possesses the traits of both the violent badman and the

intellectual hero�� 9he available criticism does not evaluate this aspect ofdualism in the

� In his article "Balter 0osley and the 9iolent 0en of Batts�" author -erry 4ryant connects the idea of dualism in 0osley' s work and the 3frican�3merican male psyche� when he describes the conflict between the man of violence and his desire for a more peaceable existence� :e writes that "0osley brings out the latent aspects of the 3frican 3merican man ofviolence� a longing for calm� order� and stability� a sense that this man contains not only badness but a potential for less socially disruptive behavior as well" (4ryant ���)�

� 5ritics have addressed the question of character� in terms ofrace and genre conventions� but have had a limited review of0osley's work beyond the 7asy 7awlin's detective series� Bithin this series� there has been an extensive review of the relationship between the 7asy 7awlins and 0ouse 3lexander characters� and suggestions that they serve as archetypes of the traditional 3frican folk heroes� the badman and the trickster� 4oth -ohn 9roesser� in the anthology $ cRPlaQiRQ pR &niPe DicpiRQ, and 0ary Doung� author of "Balter 0osley 6etective 8iction and 4lack 5ulture''� have compared 7asy 7awlins to the trickster figure� because of his use ofdouble talk and deception (9roesser ���� Doung ���� �������)� 4ecause trickery and malarkey are intellectual processes that this archetype figure must use in his deceptions� ; have chosen to associate the trickster figure with the intellectual protagonists of 7llison and 0osley's black heroes� 3s stated� 0osley uses the badman archetype as an essential counterpart to his intellectual hero� and as in folklore� this violent badman is a heroic figure within the 3frican�3merican community� 0osley's intellectual black hero� 7asy 7awlins� departs from the inherent violent nature of the badman archetype so that he can adapt to the more mainstream traits of the contemporary detective hero�

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dynamic between 7asy and 0ouse in the 7awlins series or do a comprehensive� cross�

series analysis that broadens the scope of available criticism beyond the detective genre

to identify recurrent themes of dualism in both the 7asy 7awlins and the 8earless -ones

detective series� 4y ignoring this persistent theme� they do not acknowledge the impact

of social oppression and racism on black literature� as the pre�civil rights era black hero is

not portrayed as a multidimensional character� able to resolve the plot for both author and

reader� ;nitially� 0osley satisfies this conflict by consistently adding a badman sidekick

who fulfills the functions that the intellectual protagonist cannot complete alone�

3nother aspect of 0osley's writing that critics have failed to evaluate is his

progression from the two central figures within the detective series to his first evolved

black male hero character� 6ocrates 8ortlow� found in his first novel series� 8ortlow

embodies both the badman and the intellectual archetypes in one person� 0osley's

evolution of the black hero is consistent with the progression of the 3merican 5ivil

7ights movement� 4ecause of the pre�civil rights setting� his characters' restricted

identities coincide with the restricted social standing of blacks during this same time in

3merican history� 3s 0osley transitions to his novel series� he also shifts

chronologically into the post civil rights era� :e begins to integrate a multi�faceted black

hero who acts with more autonomy in his environment�

0y underlying argument suggests that the dual character formula that 0osley

uses provides an avenue for the black hero and his sidekick to access resources within the

white and black communities that neither can access alone in a racially oppressive pre�

civil rights era� :owever� the black hero can never achieve real political and community

power as long as the badman and intellectual archetypes are divided into two separate

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characters� as the intellectual has difficulty finding respect within the black community�

while the badman is abhorred and feared within the mainstream dominant culture� 4ver

time� 0osley sets the stage for a single black male protagonist� in the body of 6ocrates

8ortlow� to take on the characteristics of the intellectual and the badman� 9he newly

integrated black hero finds a place ofacceptance and support within his own community�

:is community rallies behind him� which ultimately translates into his having political

influence that his predecessors did not have� :e progresses to the degree that he

successfully uses social activism against those institutions that continue their legacy of

racial discrimination and oppression�

9here is no argument that 0osley has found success in a genre that is heavily

saturated with white prototypes but severely lacking in a strong 3frican�3merican

tradition� Bith his success have come questions ofwhether 0osley has created

something new to add to the white crime novel convention or if he has merely taken a

multi�colored pen to place 3frican�3merican characters into ethnic locations� 0osley's

detective characters are compared most frequently with white counterpart 7aymond

5handler's� ;n her article� "3ower and 0nowledge in Balter 0osley's BeriO iQ a %Oqe

Bneoo"-" 0arilyn 5� Besley contends that classic and hardboiled detective fiction are at

their root searching for knowledge about the violence that threatens "civic order" (���)�

6he suggests that white detectives like 3hilip 0arlowe� although critical of the system�

are ultimately "FservantsH of the dominant system oflaw and order�" while 0osley's

black detectives find themselves in an ethical dilemma� because the dominant system of

law has been historically unjust toward the 3frican�3merican male� 9hrough violence�

the black hero must adapt his loyalties to dominant society to fit his own "needs for

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respect and freedom" (Besley ���)�� :nlike the white detective� who more naturally

upholds a system where he is automatically granted respect and freedom on face value�

the black detective must earn those rights that his counterpart is freely given�

4lack masculinity is not a static concept� but evolves with the same sluggish

fluidity ofour gradually changing 3merican socio�political environment� 9he

characterization of the black male hero is ever consistent with the environments in which

both the authors and the characters live� 5hris 7uiz�9elasco indirectly associates the

presentation ofviolence in the central male character of the 7asy 7awlins series as a

necessary role in the larger framework of black masculinity in his article "1ost in these

6amn Bhite :alls� 3ower and 0asculinity in Balter 0osley's 8iction�" :e writes that

masculinity "does not arise in isolation but as a result of social� cultural� and political

forces" (7uiz�9elasco ���)� 5onsistent with 7uiz�9elasco� in her article� "4eing 4lack

9here� 7acial 6ubjectivity and 9emporality in Balter 0osley's 6etective 3ovels�"

6alaynne 7nglish argues that the classic hero and the black hero may operate within the

same time and location� but the social framework that each detective must operate within

has a distinctive influence on both how they are treated within and how they respond to

their world (���)� 7uiz�9elasco and 7nglish concur that it is the environment in which

black male detectives must live that influences the way that his character evolves� causing

violence and masculinity to be indelibly tied together�� 9he white detective has more

� 8or the 3frican�3merican detective� attributes ofrespect and freedom cannot be tied to the inherent freedom that is given to individuals based on their race- he must quantify respect and freedom� based on tangibles� such as home ownership and physical freedom� Bhile the white detective role is seemingly more altruistic� as he works to wipe out corruption while maintaining the overall social status quo of a system where he has been a primary benefactor� 0osley's black detective uses his role in a personal pursuit of middle class respect and freedom� which is primarily shown through home ownership� � 7nglish writes� "In both content and form� 0osley' s novels support my argument in that they represent black people who live according to a distinct timeline- they also help demonstrate the commonplace that black literature traces a distinct timeline� Det 0osley and his writings are also very much ofand in their

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freedom in the sense that he can mirror the classic image of masculinity within the genre

convention and never be threatened with accusations of betraying his community by

upholding the rules of a corrupt civil authority� 7uiz�9elasco and 7nglish are responding

to the reasons the 7awlins character may have less allegiance to civil authority and may

need to use violence to operate outside of mainstream law enforcement� :owever� it is

not 7asy� but the character of 0ouse 3lexander who typically responds to opposition in a

violent manner� 7asy is more likely to use doublespeak and trickery to avoid a

confrontation� 7asy's reliance on violence is strictly a condition of his association with

his badman sidekick� who is essential in ensuring that 7awlins is rescued from danger in

time to continue his pursuit ofjustice� 9he fact that 0osley's intellectual and violent

black male characters are severely segmented throughout his first detective series speaks

directly to 7uiz�9elasco and 7nglish's premise that the black hero is a product of his

time and environment�

9he same delineation can be made concerning the separation of passive and

militant social action in the history of 3frican�3merican civil protest� 4oth had an

integral place in 3frican�3merican 5ivil 7ights history� 3s ; evaluate the progression of

the intellectual and sidekick characters toward one fully integrated black hero character�

this progression is consistent with the increased integration of the 3frican 3merican

within mainstream 3merican culture since the ����'s� 9he 3frican 3merican culture has

been on a similar trajectory of using both intellect and violent protest to secure a more

time� :is 7asy 7awlins detective series� his best�known fiction� obviously inhabits multiple temporalities� 9hese hard�boiled novels operate as historical fiction on at least two levels� 3ot only are the novels' settings prior to their publication dates� but the hard�boiled detective novel itself constitutes a kind of literary anachronism� a postmodern return to a form born in and of modem disillusionment regarding the liberal democratic state" (7nglish ���)�

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equitable social role� as neither alone was capable of creating sustained social change for

blacks in 3merica�

9he search for acceptance into middle class 3merica is arguably a chief

motivation for the 3frican�3merican detective� because he sees this as a source of respect

and freedom� 7qually important to the 3frican�3merican male is his sense of

masculinity� which ironically is closely tied to whether he is respected by others and has

sufficient liberty within his society� 0osley's black detective has few tangible social or

financial options to bolster his sense of manhood and this is further complicated by the

fact that he is placed in a time when he suffers abuses of racism and discrimination�

which frequently leads to false arrests and beatings from the subjects of his investigation

and the police� 9hese events are a continual scolding of the black male� which reduce

him from the status of an adult male to the belittled child of a dominant white legal

system� :aving a violent image becomes a primary indicator of masculinity for the

3frican�3merican male because of political powerlessness and lack of social influence

outside of the black community� ;n "Balter 0osley and the 9iolent 0en of Batts�"

author -erry 4ryant argues that because 7asy responds to his hostile environment with

reason and intellectualism� "0osley carries the probe of the violent man by an 3frican

3merican novelist to its furthest point to date" (���)� 9he strength of4yrant's argument

lies in the fact that 0osley does not require his black hero to rely solely on a raw� violent

nature but allows his protagonist to show emotional conflict and a desire to uphold a

standard of ethics in an unethical environment� 9his ultimately requires his protagonist to

shed some vestiges of the badman persona and adopt characteristics of the classic hero

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who exhibits middle class values like home ownership and entrepreneurial endeavors or

at the very least� mimic behaviors that allow him to achieve his middle class aspirations� 5

7asy's desire to take part in the 3merican 6ream is what differentiates him from

the classic detective- while his primary goal is to fledge out a literal and figurative home

within the 3merican social fabric� the classic detective is driven to uphold the existing

social order� 4ryant also indicates that another distinguishing characteristic is that there

is less romanticism in 0osley's use of his detective 7asy 7awlins than in other traditional

detectives like 5handler's representation of 3hilip 0arlowe (���)� 7ather than

approaching the case as a consummate detective in search of greater truths� 7asy is far

more ambivalent about his role as a detective and only undertakes his career out of

desperation to meet his mortgage payment� 8or him� upholding civic order is a much

lower priority than maintaining his home and finding some form ofjustice for subjugated

members of the 3frican�3merican community where he lives- 7asy ultimately feels a

responsibility to his community� because their interests are neither acknowledged nor

upheld by mainstream society� �

0osley pulls his detective and sidekick characters directly from 3frican folklore�

which separates his black detective from the classic detective model and allows the

� In "3n :n�7asy 7elationship� Balter 0osley's 6ignifyin(g) 6etective and the 4lack 5ommunity�" -ohn 9roesser describes how the classic detective� like 0arlowe� typically identifies both his name and profession� but 7asy must assess his environment and adjust his persona to match or clash with the perceptions of those around him (������� )� 9roesser explains that "9his ability links him to the great trickster� the 6ignifying 0onkey� a figure that 'seems to dwell at thFeH space between two linguistic domains' � the 7uropean 3merican and the 3frican 3merican" (��� )� 8or 7asy� language becomes the object of disguise and manipulation� as he deceives people by either meeting or failing to meet their expectations ofa black man in ����'s urban 3merica�

� In ";ntellectuals and the 3ersisting 6ignificance of 7ace"� Billiam 0� 4anks conducts a survey of contemporary black intellectuals� which suggests� "the powerful universalistic imperative of intellectual training centers does not subvert the racial and ethnic attachments of 4lack intellectuals� 3ot only did the respondents in this study acknowledge the relevance of racial�ethnic group identity influences to their thinking� all but a few (less than ��%) accepted a responsibility to reflect or address the interests of 4lacks in their work" (4anks ��)�

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author to incorporate folklore from 3frican�3merican culture that has not previously

been present in this highly restrictive genre� 3uthor 0ary Doung elaborates more on the

traditional application of the 4adman and the 9rickster characters from 3frican folklore

in 0osley's work� 6he argues that "0osley has taken the two heroic characters� the

trickster and the bad 4lack man� and updated them while retaining many of their historic

attributes of deception� misdirection and violence" (Doung ���)� Doung maintains that

0osley is reshaping the classic detective genre� which is adapting to cover 3frican�

3merican themes and is also broadening the 3frican�3merican literary tradition� 0ost

integral to her argument is the assessment of the primary detective protagonist in the

classic and 3frican�3merican crime novel� Bhile the white detective is derivative of a

historical model that can be traced back to classic 4ritish crime novels�� "0osley's

recurring characters F ��� H are drawn directly from 3frican�3merican folklore and are not

black�faced copies of the hard boiled tradition" (Doung ���)� 0osley follows the

structure of the classic detective novel� in the sense that his protagonist is the lone hero in

search of truth� in spite of an unjust social structure that threatens to destroy him�

:owever� 0osley incorporates archetypal characters that are unique to black 3frican and

1atin culture and places these figures in a time and place that is highly significant to the

3frican�3merican culture� 4ecause these characters are situated in 13 during the mid�

nineteenth century and written from the perspective of a subjugated black hero� 0osley is

doing something unique in comparison to previous authors in this classic detective genre�

� 0arilyn Besley compares Balter 0osley's 7asy 7awlins and 3hilip 0arlowe to their predecessor from the classic 4ritish detective� 6herlock :olmes� Bhile she suggests that 0arlowe and :olmes use and seek knowledge to protect the dominant class from violence� 7asy must pursue "black knowledge�" because the system of power that the white detective upholds has been established and thrived on the oppression of 3frican 3mericans (���)� :pholding that system� in its current state� is a betrayal of the black detective ' s ethnic identity and his loyalty to his community�

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0elly �� �

:is plots mainstream the intimate details of the 3frican�3merican civil rights struggle in

a way that puts unjust social and legal institutions on display� establishes a moral main

character that has previously been denied the black male in 3merican history� and

introduces a new black hero that has been forged through violence and oppression and

found a way to come through the fire polished and prepared to defend the black

community�

8urthermore� there is an inherent duality in the nature of the badman character

because he is ruthless and violent yet holds a quasi�hero status in 3frican folklore and in

0osley's more contemporary application of this figure� :is use of violence and

intimidation has been so perfected that the fear and respect he receives within his own

community becomes an admirable quality� 4oth -erry 4ryant and 7oger 4erger describe

0ouse as 7asy's antithesis� because he is the quintessential 4adman (4ryant ���� 4erger

��� )� :e does not take on the cloak and character of the badman to solve a crime or

when his back is against the wall- instead� 0ouse is a bad man�� 0osley's use of the

0ouse 3lexander character as instrumental to the safety and well�being of his lead

detective 7asy 7awlins shows adeparture from the traditional 3frican folklore badman

hero� 9his badman character is� in modern terms� a remorseless sociopath that leaves the

remnants of violence and murder wherever he goes� 9here is an inconsistency� as 7asy

and 0ouse frequently share the label of badman� but 7asy's middle�class aspirations pull

� 4erger goes even further with this analysis� as he relates it to the duality that 0osley is faced with� by assimilating the traditions of the white crime detective genre� while trying to maintain an authentic ethnicity in his novel series (���)� :e suggests that 0osley is in danger of figuratively "passing"� by mimicking the conventions of the white crime novel and not going far enough in carving out new territory within the ever�broadening black detective genre�

Page 21: Reinventing the Black Hero in the Fiction of Walter Mosley

.JOO\ 17

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.JOO\ 18

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Page 23: Reinventing the Black Hero in the Fiction of Walter Mosley

.JOO\ 19

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Page 24: Reinventing the Black Hero in the Fiction of Walter Mosley

.JOO\ 20

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.JOO\ 21

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