Writing

Wright, suppressed by his mother’s lashes and his grandmother’s religion, is finally able to express himself through writing. He creates a story that whispers of “longing and death (120),” thoughts and feelings Wright had been burdened by because of his mother's paralysis. Hiding these thoughts was draining and unhealthy for Wright. It excites him to pen the story for it is something of his own, infused with his own emotions and worries. “There was no plot, no action, nothing save atmosphere and longing and death. But I had never in my life done anything like it; I had made something, no matter how bad it was; and it was mine… (120).” It pleases him to share the tale because it allows him to communicate with another human being a topic higher than food and punishment. By reading his story to his neighbor, Wright tells her his feelings, but not in an overly open, uncomfortable way. He is “sharing with her the burden of his existence,” as Patricia Hampl wrote, and he finds it greatly gratifying.