The Man Who Was Almost A Man Analysis

Young teenagers try too hard to become adults. Sometimes many actions teenagers think are mature, but always end up backfiring on them. Richard Wright’s “The Man Who Was Almost a Man” demonstrates how a young teenager seeks a level of maturity and independence that he’s not yet ready for. For example, Dave thinks he is ready to show everyone that he is a man, but in the end his actions backfire leaving him with in a position with less respect than he had before.
Since the beginning of the story, the main character, Dave; a young 17 year old that works for a man named Mr. Hawkins; a land owner, experiences a conflict with some of the other field workers that made him think that if he had a gun; they wouldn’t address him as a little boy no more. In the story he says;
“Shucks, Ah ain scareda them even if they are biggern than me! Aw, Ah know what Ahma do. Ahm going by ol Joe’s soto n git that Sears Roebuck catlog n look at them guns. Mebbe Ma will lemme buy one when she gits mah pay from ol man Hawkins. Ahma beg her t gimme some money. Ahm ol ernough to hava gun. Ahm. Seventeen. Almost a man. Shucks, a man oughta hava little gun aftah he done worked hard all day.”(pg.166)
Dave thinks by owning a gun, people won’t treat him as a
Richard Wright’s “The Man Who Was Almost a Man” demonstrated how a young teenager seeks a level of maturity and independence that he’s not yet ready for. Dave really didn’t make mature decisions and he ended up in a hole bigger than he was before. He thought by buying a gun, he would become a man. He wasn’t ready enough to handle the responsibility with owning a gun and misused it killing one of Mr. Hawkins cows. He totally misunderstood what the true meaning of becoming a man is and had to pay the consequences but even then deciding to run away from his problem proved again that he might not ever be ready to become a