An Exploration of the Relationship between
Community and Capitalism in Black Crime Fiction
by Tim Lawlor, Lancaster University

 

Black Crime Fiction was, for a long time, widely neglected and often viewed as a less complex take on already established noir conventions. Writers using black characters had to forego the concept of ‘people who become “black” because of their “shady” moral behaviour’1, meaning a reader’s interest was often lost as main protagonists had, due to racial stereotyping, already transgressed from “good” to “bad”. However, this simplified viewpoint ignores the fact that changing the skin colour of the characters from white to black, leads to ‘significant transformations in the language, structure and meaning of the genre’2 and essentially a new perspective on the dominant society. This essay will attempt to explore the relationship between black community, a sense of ‘communion; fellowship’3, and capitalism; the method of obtaining wealth on which the dominant, white society is built  in Chester Himes’ novel A Rage in Harlem, Walter Mosley’s A Red Death and the HBO television drama The Wire, whilst occasionally applying Marxist theory where appropriate.

In A Rage in Harlem, Chester Himes paints Harlem as a hellish underworld of despair in which its black residents are literally trapped. The narrator of the novel repeatedly draws attention to the various states of decay as he notes the alleyways ‘stinking of many varieties of excrement’4 and ‘piles of garbage stretching … as far as the eye could see’ (p.4). Whist Himes gives no straightforward reason as to why Harlem is in such a state of disorder he describes its geographical situation as ‘in a valley far below’ (p.102) the university buildings of the white world. The university buildings can be seen as an image that connotes capitalism, an institution for rich white New Yorkers that, from their elevated vantage point, will always look down at the black city of Harlem. This institution perpetuates black repression to the point at which black people feel alien outside of their prescribed area. An example of this inability of black characters to enter the white world can be seen when Jackson, fleeing the police, despite his relative innocence, leaves Harlem and on entering the white world finds he was ‘going at seventy miles an hour and there was a stone wall ahead’ (p.152). To avoid disaster Jackson has to immediately head back into Harlem as the white world is for him a no-go zone. 

The stone wall that Jackson encounters is a concrete barrier created by the dominant society’s capitalist ideology; ‘a way of life imposed on black people through social injustice’ (Diawara 1993). As the narrator states in A Rage in Harlem it is this barrier that leads to Harlem’s residents being ‘convulsed in desperate living’ (p.102). Interestingly the murky, grey world of Harlem creates a startling contrast to the white world, which further illustrates the desperate conditions that Harlem residents suffer. The description of white Detective John Lawrence sitting in a downtown office’ , ‘his blond crew-cut hair shining with cleanliness’ (p.166) is the only description of sanitation throughout the whole novel.
The nightmarish qualities that Himes’ Harlem possesses seem to be a direct reaction to white repression. In being below the white world we see a movement away from the parental superstructure represented by the university buildings into a realm in which a furious id dominates. Himes has noted before that the Harlem he created for his crime novels was not necessarily accurate but ‘his own imaginative construct’(Horsley 2005) and this may explain the animalistic behaviour of various violent characters. It also seems darkly ironic that Goldy’s drug fuelled nightmare in which ‘he could see everyone dead’ (p.87) is almost identical to the actual outcome of Himes’ novel.

The issue of community and its  relationship to capitalism in A Rage in Harlem is at times difficult to discuss as Himes’ Harlem is almost devoid of any fellowship between its residents. Take for example Jackson’s claim when begging for sympathy from a phoney state marshal that ‘I just yielded to a temptation. You’re a coloured man like me, you ought to understand’ (p.8). This concept of brotherhood is in some respects an insult to the residents of Harlem as it denies the race a complex group of characters, assuming that all black people are similar. In fact Jackson is just as quick to retract his statement, shown when he sees the drunkard Big Fats and angrily shouts ‘You’re a disgrace to the race’ (p.135) displaying that empathy between the black residents of Harlem is at times non existent. Jackson can’t see that they are both attempting to escape their dwelling, Big Fats by drinking and Jackson by attempting to illegally raise the denomination of money.

The desire to obtain money, often by any means possible, is an important theme in Himes’ novel and is often the direct cause of a decline in community spirit. Take for example Jackson’s landlady who Jackson describes as ‘evil a woman as God ever made’ (p.13) seemingly because she wants to collect the rent money on time. She later goes on to tell the police about Jackson and his partner Imabelle in hope of getting the money for a new stove from them. Protecting one another in the black community is important as shown when the narrator states ‘It was the code of Harlem for one brother to help another lie to white cops’ (p.91). The landlady in entering into capitalism has foregone her community spirit for money and therefore becomes a disliked character. Disgust for these community traitors can be seen when a ‘colored man disapproved of his companion’s volunteering information to white cops about a colored boy’ (p.131).

Although it would appear that in Himes’ novel the black community attempts to protect its members from the arms of the law, in doing this it often protects criminals that exploit the black community. This can be seen in the case of Hank, Jodie and Slim who use a kind of inverted version of capitalism, that denies access to whites (like white capitalism denies access to blacks) in which they attempt to sell shares in a non existent goldmine  to ‘worthy colored people from all over the country [giving them] a chance to share in the profits ‘ (p. 68). This is a direct example of capitalism creating ruptures in black community spirit. Another example can be seen when Jackson’s cross-dressing brother, Goldy impersonates a nun, selling tickets to heaven. Whilst Goldy’s scheme is seemingly much less harmful to the community, its capitalist roots in obtaining wealth does in fact continue a negative cycle of repression as the people donating become less well off whilst Goldy feeds his drug addiction.

Perhaps the most striking image of capitalism reeking havoc on the black community in A Rage in Harlem can be seen when the ‘short sharp blast of the train whistle, signalling that it had crossed the river into Harlem’ can be heard in one of Harlem’s darkest streets. The train can be seen a metaphor for white capitalism entering the ghetto: the building and characters it passes reflecting its devastating effect on a community like ‘a mirror … placed at an angle to reality, a broken mirror’5 As the train passes through the city we see how capitalism and black poverty are interconnected in the way ‘Goldy’s scream mingled with the scream of the locomotive as the train thundered past overhead’ (p.116). The damage after the train has visited Harlem is described with sickening detail as ‘lice ridden beds …tb lungs and uneasy foetuses … fat, blood filled bedbugs crawling on black skin’ (p.116) shake whilst Goldy’s blood pours on to the pavement.

The fact that the train ‘thunders past overhead’ (p.116) emphasises the futility of the situation: the black community are unable to stop something so established and powerful that relentlessly circles their city and traps them within. Norlisha Crawford states ‘most of the absurdist  business plans/scams devised by Himes’ Harlem characters are logical market driven enterprises, that are in their own right and context legitimate … Right and wrong Hime’s novel suggests, is to some degree a moot point’6. The point that Himes novel attempts to convey, as Crawford explains, is that the characters on display are only that way because of the situation they are faced with: they are repressed and trapped by white capitalism and so construct their own version of it, leading to a perpetual cycle of crime and poverty.

Whilst Chester Himes details the struggles of a black community forced into crime and poverty by an all encompassing dominant white ideology, the overbearing theme in Walter Mosley’s novel A Red Death are the difficulties Easy Rawlings experiences  being immersed in both the black community and the white capitalism and the effect on himself and the community around him.             

Throughout the novel Easy,  who assumes the role of narrator, makes clear the that his doings in the capitalist, property-owning world and his role as a member of the black community are antithetical of each other - this is evident in  his desire to hide his status from fellow members of his community. Despite the pride of Easy takes in his property, shown by the way he states ‘I’d go there even when there was no work to be done’7, Easy still keeps it a secret: ‘you know he don’t work for me,” I lied. “ It’s the other way around.” (p.3). This lying shows Easy’s desire to be accepted into the black community as a simple man and nothing more. The abuse that one can receive from being outside the community, as a capitalist, can be seen when Mofass is lambasted by Poinsettia for not letting her skip rent: ‘BASTARD! … Mothafuckin’ bastard! (p.6)

Easy’s problem as Peter Messent notes, is that he ‘is not only bound within the social and cultural relations peculiar to the black community, he is also subject to a larger and more oppressive system of relations organised by the dominant white world’8 . This means that Easy takes on more responsibility than his fellow community members and some of his actions have negative effects on the community. This can be seen in the case of his friendship with Odell, who as Easy notes ‘wouldn’t even return my nod. It was hard to lose a friend like that’ (p.181). The reason that Odell stops talking to Easy is because of the damage caused by Easy’s private investigation work for the FBI at the First African Church, which he is forced to do to in order to hold his position as a capitalist property owner. However, Easy makes it clear that despite being a proprietor, community is still one of his main priorities, shown when he states that ‘you cain’t get me t’go after my own people … I don’t wanna hurt the people at First African’ (p.53). However, as Easy is also part of the Capitalist white world we see a slightly altered attitude in comparison the black community in Himes’ novel. Easy is unwilling to hurt his community, unless ‘these guys broke the law like you say, I don’t mind that’ (p.53), whereas the trapped characters in A Rage in Harlem lie to police in any situation, Easy has had a heightened sense of responsibility that entry into the capitalist world leads to.

This heightened sense of responsibility also seems to lead to a world of selfishness and isolation. The character of Mofass who is having similar money problems with the government is cold and calculated, ‘Harder than diamonds’ (p.9) and whilst Easy lost Odells’ friendship due to his bond to white society and the damage it caused to the community, Mofass constructs their relationship purely around business shown when he states ‘You my best customer, Mr Rawlins’ (p.245). This concept of capitalism effecting the way one thinks can be seen in Karl Marx’s The German Ideology where he writes ‘Conceiving, thinking, the mental, intercourse of men, appear at this stage the direct efflux of their material behaviour’9. This concept is evident in Easy’s treatment of Poinsettia; rather than thinking of her as a human he thinks of her purely in terms the income she provides. However, Easy’s unconscious comes back to haunt him and show how ‘his property ownership leads him to compromise at every turn his independent black sense of self’ (Horsley 2005) when in a drunken stupor his thoughts lead to Poinsttia and he rues his dabbling in capitalism, divulging that ‘the fact that I was so selfish sickened me … “Th’ew her outta her own place. Th’ew her out and now she’s dead. You cain’t trust no niggah like me”’ (pp.124 –128)

The nightmare world of Himes’ Harlem feels very distant from Mosley’s post-war Los Angeles with its ‘peaceful feeling about the streets’ (p.4).  Instead we see it manifest in Easy’s mind due to the stress he is placed under residing between the white and black worlds. We can see the attraction to Easy of an unconscious world where responsibility is non existent when he comes into contact with EttaMae’s son LaMarque and watches him ‘doing a crazy dance in my potato patch … with his head thrown back, and cackl[ing] deep down in his throat’ (p.15). Easy sees the joy in this escapism, despite the damage it would causes to the community (the destruction of his garden) and is unable to be stern with boy, stating ‘I couldn’t keep from smiling’ (p.15) showing how he wished for a world as free as LaMarque’s. We also see a far less comfortable side of unconscious escapism in Easy’s thoughts when he hears the voice of his deep-rooted id fighting for prevalence over his capitalist superego. This is evident when Easy is confronted with the responsibility of paying tax money he earned working a previous private investigation he states ‘a husky voice in my head said, “kill the mothafukah …Man wanna take from you … he better be ready to back it up ’ (pp.42 - 43). Whilst this voice appears to being helping Easy he realises that whilst damaging the white capitalist world it will also damage the black community, shown when Easy states ‘Maybe I would have shot the Negro in the overalls too, I don’t know’ (p.43).

Whilst it may appear then that Capitalism is something that Easy should deride if he wants to be part of his black community, it is also presented as perhaps a necessity for forward movement of the black community, something that Himes was unable to envision in A Rage in Harlem. Of course, it must be taken into account that whilst both novels are set in the same period of history, Mosley was in fact writing in the early 1990s, when race segregation had declined considerably even if race tension had not.  Easy notes his displeasure at the concept of  ‘brotherhood’ in black community stating ‘one thing I can’t stand is calling a man you don’t like “brother”’ (p.70). Here we see the importance of the self in black community and entering into the capitalist world is a way of achieving a certain self-respect. In Twentieth Century Crime Fiction (2005), Lee Horsley has written of Easy’s ‘sense of self-division’ that comes from attempting to better yourself and it is this self-division that makes Easy such a complex and versatile character. At points it seems that capitalism is taking Easy away from his roots in black community but he does in fact make sure that any money he earns from his working for the FBI goes into rebuilding the community, show when he states  ‘I didn’t intend to keep anything. I gave to the families … I even donated a thousand dollars to the African Migration’ (p.238). Easy is able to identity the dangers of the capitalist world and how it enforces black repression shown when he states ‘Craxton and Lawrence had me so worried  my money and my freedom that I had become their slave’ (p.124) but also believes that in entering this world and paying off his debts he will no longer be lumbered with the status of a slave but be a free man .

In the television programme The Wire the concept of a black community being trapped in repressed position by the dominant white ideology is seemingly again an even more complex theme. Whereas before, as Norlisha Crawford (2005) notes that black characters in Himes’ Harlem were ‘shut away from mainstreet routes to economic and political opportunity that “whiteness” granted citizens’ and Walter Mosley’s Easy Rawlins suffered from something that Scott Bunyan described as ‘a slow realisation that black people cannot afford to believe that they inhabit extra-legal space’10, meaning that Easy was not free to move where he wanted and do what he wanted as he was a black man in a white world, in The Wire this is not the case. The series is set in the Twenty-first Century and  in the first episode we see that blackness is in many respects an advantage over whiteness; this can seen when discussing Lieutenant Cedric Daniels possible promotion to Major, a colleague remarks that he is ‘black, still young’11, showing blackness as something that now allows for extra-legal space. However, despite this assumption, we still see a black community suffering poverty in the urban environ of West Baltimore.

David Simon, creator and co-writer of The Wire explains that the show is about ‘the very simple idea that we’re worth less every day … It’s the triumph of capitalism over human value’12 . By focusing its lenses on an isolated black neighbourhood The Wire exposes the damage that capitalism has done to many African-American communities (and the working class in general) and how these communities further degrade in mimicking the white capitalism that at first entrapped it. Perhaps the best example in the show of ruthless capitalism can be seen with the character of Stringer Bell and how his actions effect the community around him. Stringer uses the economics he learns in his university class and applies them directly to the people around him. D’Angelo sums up Stringers modus operandi when he states to his girlfriend, ‘they playing you with that “we family and it’s all about love”, that’s how they do … when they got no more use for you, that family shit disappears, it’s just about business Donette’ (The Wire ep.18, 2004). What D’Angelo said becomes the dark truth as Stringer orders his murder; Stringer treats D’Angelo like a worker who provides the commodity of labour power and follows a concept that Marx sets out about the relationship between capitalist and proletariat: a ‘capitalist discharges him [the labourer] whenever he thinks fit, as soon as he no longer gets any profit out of him’13. D’Angelo is costing more to keep on as a member of the team than he puts back in, so Stringer has him killed so that the business can continue to make profits.

This ruthless version of white capitalism becomes what is known as “the game”.  People who are bought up in these isolated urban environments often have no choice but to work in this illegal business structures. Take for example the character of Wallace, a sixteen year old child who works for Avon and Stringer. Wallace is repulsed by the game and his complicity in it, shown when he states ‘it fucks me up’ (The Wire, ep.6 2002)  and later to D’Angelo, ‘I just don’t wanna play’ (The Wire, ep.9 2002). However, despite his reluctance to take part in the Stringer and Avon’s street business he is unable to escape it. After staying with his grandmother by the coast he feels uncomfortable outside the projects and tells a disappointed D’Angelo that ‘I guess it’s a home … this shit – this is me, yo’ (The Wire, ep12, 2002). Wallace has be institutionalised by what could be called “street capitalism” and denied the ability to think outside of the boundaries that Avon and Stringer’s company policies command. As Marx writes, the worker’s, in this case Wallace’s, ‘sole source of livelihood is the sale of his labour power, [he] cannot leave the whole class of purchasers … without renouncing his existence’ (Literary Theory: An Anthology 2004). The class of purchasers Marx discusses are the capitalists, who literally own their employees in the way in which Stringer and Avon own Wallace, without them he is unable to live.

The “street capitalism” discussed earlier leads to a “street ideology” that reflects its harsh origins. Marx writes that ‘Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life’ (Literary Theory: An Anthology 2004) , meaning that it is the system that allows people to live (obtain money, feed and clothe themselves) that leads to the direct way they think. This seems to be case in projects of West Baltimore as there appears to be no room for humanist thinking. When Wallace talks about his mother fondly, Bodie, a peer, curses him for being so weak and states that a ‘soft link break’ the chain’ (The Wire, ep.12 2002). The reason both Wallace and D’Angelo are removed by the gang is because their humanist values are at odds with the ideology of the street. Even though Avon remarks that ‘family is what count – family’s what it about – family will always be there ‘cause it blood’ (The Wire, ep.5 2002), the only thing that is really important to them is money and sending what D’Angelo describes as ‘a message to the ‘jects’ (The Wire, ep.13 2002), a message of fear that enforces their ideology and demands complicity.

The Wire manages to expose the harsh effects capitalism has on the black lower classes by what Georg Lukács calls ‘realism’, which Terry Eagleton (2002) explains as the capturing the ‘general and the particular, the conceptual and the sensuous, the social and individual [being] torn apart by the “alienations” of capitalism … combining them into a total form and fleshing them out with concrete experience’ . An example of this concept at work can be seen with the character and narrative of D’Angelo  as we see how capitalism effects his relationship with himself, his lovers, friends and family in extreme detail, whilst learning about the system that forced him into despair and eventually killed him. From this we discern that ‘unencumbered capitalism is not a substitute for social policy’14 and that it is ultimately the reason for the lack of community is West Baltimore.

In conclusion, the relationship between community and capitalism in black crime fiction is ultimately detrimental; it is seemingly impossible to uphold a sense of fellowship whilst trying to obtain self-wealth using capitalist methods. In Himes’ A Rage in Harlem, we see a black community trapped in poverty due to a restrictive ideology formulated by white capitalism, which when members of the community try to mimic in an attempt to escape their dwelling only create more harm. Mosley’s A Red Death presents a more complex idea that, whilst capitalism may damage the black community in the short-run, it will allow the black community to eventually achieve equality in the white world, if they are willing to compromise the traditions that make them a community and focus on themselves as individuals. In The Wire viewers are shown a world in which the claws of capitalism are inescapable – black communities resemble totalitarian states due to the extreme and imprisoning ideology created by the “street capitalism” in use. Ironically lawyer Maurice Levy in The Wire perhaps best illustrates capitalism and its effect on the community whilst attempting to defend it, telling the sociopath Omar: ‘you are amoral … stealing from the life blood of our city, you are a parasite’. Omar sees the similarity between his criminality and the lawyer’s capitalist thought, proclaiming ‘just like you man, I got the shotgun, you got the briefcase’ (The Wire, ep.19 2004).

 

Bibliography

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Messent, Peter (ed.), Criminal Proceedings: The Contemporary American Crime Novel, (London: Pluto Press, 1997)

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Trumble, William R. and Angus Stevenson (eds.),  Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, volume 1 (A-M), fifth edition, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003)

Vine, Richard, ‘Totally Wired’, Guardian Unlimited, < http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/theguide/archives/tv_and_radio/2005/01/totally_wired.html> [accessed 21st December 2007]