Come out of the Wilderness is one of the short stories by James Baldwin taken out of the book ‘Going to Meet the Man’. This story is about a girl, Ruth, who works at an insurance company and is currently dating a white man. The two live together. On the other hand, she keeps thinking back to her old boyfriend, Arthur, who is black as well and they lived together for four years in the South. This paper reflects on the prominent theme of racism as is depicted in the story.
In the beginning of the story, Ruth is currently dating Paul, who is a painter and coincidentally white. Nonetheless, she seems not be satisfied with their relationship and is quite excited when Mr. Davis decided to increase her salary as well as take her out. Nonetheless, the lunch turned out to be a dinner, leaving Ruth confused as to the intentions of Mr. Davis. However, during the dramatic interaction between Ruth and Mr. Davis, we see her inner desire to have a black man to date her – exposing some form of racial preference. This is because she thinks back to her ex-boyfriend despite having a white boyfriend at the time. Moreover, she seems more relaxed in her interactions with Mr. Davis as opposed to Paul her boyfriend. Little of Paul is mentioned in the story, depicting her preference for interaction with black men. She also thinks of an ex-boyfriend who treated her like a slave girl, outlining the struggle that ladies of the time had with racism, constantly being subjected to bad treatment (Baldwin, 1965).
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In a short analytical thought then, it can be said that racism was a real issue in Ruth’s life, and continues to be in modern day society as racial problem persist through the education system and socio-economic inequality. More of concern is the persistence of racism in social interactions among elite people.
References
Baldwin, J. (1965). Come out of the Wilderness. New York: Popular Library.
