Living A Life Of Lies And Deception: A Book Review

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Living a Life of Lies and Deception


In the novel, The Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man, by James Weldon Johnson, the author attempts to express his views on the “Negro Question.” By writing in both the North and the South, as well as from the perspective of both a white man and a black man, the author is able to gain a wide array of different perspectives.
James Weldon Johnson was born in 1871, in Jacksonville, Florida. He attended segregated schools in Jacksonville until eighth grade. There were no high schools for blacks in Jacksonville, so he went to Atlanta where he continued his education. He became the first black lawyer in the state of Florida, and started the first black newspaper in the United States. Johnson used his newspaper, as well as his poems, songs, and novels to express his racial views. He was a leader among the African-American community and had a very optimistic view of racial issues.
Throughout the novel, there are many connections between the life of the protagonist and the life of Johnson. For example, both the protagonist and Johnson were or were going to be students of Atlanta University. In the novel, the protagonist is never actually able to attend the school because his money is stolen. I think that Johnson not only wrote this book to express his sentiment towards racial issues and prejudice, but also to imagine what his life, as well as the life of other Black-Americans would be like without an education.
This novel was somewhat ahead of its time, which is perhaps one of the reasons that it lacked initial success. The Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man, was written in 1921, and while the United States had come a long way from slavery, it still had a long way to go. This novel touches on the differences in opportunity, lifestyle and culture between blacks and whites, as well as between Northerners and Southerners.
The purpose of this novel is to create a “vivid and startlin...