The Long Dream: Analysis of Major Characters
"The Long Dream" explores the complexities of race and identity through its major characters, primarily focusing on Rex "Fishbelly" Tucker, a young Black man navigating a deeply segregated society in Clintonville, Mississippi. Started at the tender age of five, Fish's journey reveals the harsh realities of systemic racism and the psychological impact it has on him as he grapples with self-hatred and societal oppression. His father, Tyree Tucker, serves as a power broker within the local Black community, yet his methods of survival, which involve submission to white authority, create tension between him and Fish. Tyree's efforts to educate Fish about the brutal truths of their world are met with frustration and resentment, highlighting the generational conflict in understanding and responding to racism.
The narrative also includes figures such as Emma Tucker, Fish's mother, who provides emotional support yet lacks the influence needed to shape her son's life significantly. Other characters, like Chris Sims, a victim of a racially motivated lynching, and Gladys, a light-skinned mulatto prostitute whom Fish loves, emphasize the intersections of race, gender, and desire. The presence of Dr. Bruce, a Black physician, and Gloria Mason, Tyree's mistress, complicates the narrative with their own struggles against systemic injustices. Overall, "The Long Dream" offers a poignant analysis of the intertwining lives affected by racism, revealing how personal aspirations and societal limitations shape one's identity and dreams.
The Long Dream: Analysis of Major Characters
Author: Richard Wright
First published: 1958
Genre: Novel
Locale: Mississippi
Plot: Bildungsroman
Time: The late 1930's and the 1940's
Rex “Fishbelly” Tucker, a young black man, the central character. When the story opens, Fish is five years old, the only son of Tyree Tucker, the leading black person in Clintonville, Mississippi, which has a population of ten thousand blacks and fifteen thousand whites. Fish comes to understand that he lives in a twisted society that makes it wrong to be black. At about the age of six, he spits at his image in the mirror and exclaims, “nigger.” At the age of twelve, he is initiated into manhood when an older friend is brutally beaten, castrated, and lynched because of his involvement with a white woman. Fish's father, an undertaker, and Dr. Bruce, the town's black physician, keep Fish with them as they examine the mutilated young man's body. At the age of sixteen, Fish joins Tyree in business and watches as his father is dragged into conflict with the white power structure and is killed. Fish has information that threatens these same whites and is jailed for two years. As the book ends, he is on an airplane to Paris to join a black friend.
Tyree Tucker, Fish's father, an undertaker who owns rental property, including brothels and a bar. Tyree is the power broker between the black community and the local white establishment. When his sympathetic but uncomprehending white lawyer refers to Tyree as corrupt, the black man explodes with anger, saying that such words do not apply to black-white relations: He does what whites make him do if he wants to protect his family and provide a good life for them. His life presents a puzzle to Fish. Tyree looks down on the town's poor black population; he touches members of the lower class only when they are dead and only for money, he says. He humbles himself before whites, however, throwing himself in tears on the mercy of the white police chief and others. Fish hates his father as he sees him crawl before white people, but Fish also comes to understand Tyree's desperate need to educate him to reality. Tyree makes Fish face racism, something church leaders, teachers, and other adults had hidden from the boy. Tyree forces Fish to see that there are two worlds, the warped and disturbed dream world of the blacks that is controlled by the distant and dangerous real world of the whites. As Tyree works over the lynched man's body, he tells Fish that his job is to bury black dreams. Tyree is killed after exposing the corruption of the town's white officials.
Emma Tucker, Fish's mother. Emma, a good woman, is ineffectual in shaping Fish's life. When white people lynch Chris Sims, she has only the church to offer to Fish as a support and as protection.
Chris Sims, a twenty-four-year-old hotel employee. Chris is lynched by whites when a white woman who has enticed him into an affair becomes frightened and accuses him of rape.
Gladys, a beautiful, light-skinned mulatto prostitute at the Grove. Fish falls in love with her, which forces him to confront his attitude toward color and his fascination with white women. She burns to death in the Grove fire, just as Fish begins to earn enough to take her out of the trade.
Dr. Bruce, a fifty-year-old black physician and partner of Tyree. He works on Chris Sims's mutilated body. Dr. Bruce escapes after the Grove fire, going north with Gloria Mason.
Gloria Mason, Tyree's mistress. Gloria is a beautiful mulatto who confuses Fish because she talks and acts like a white person. He has no standards by which to judge her. She turns proof of police corruption over to Fish, and she flees to the North with Dr. Bruce.
Gerald Cantley, Clintonville's police chief. Tyree pays him graft and buries the people he murders, in return for being allowed to manage the black population of Clintonville and to run various illegal operations.