In many respects Ann Petry is a study in contrast. She came from a tiny town in New England to Harlem in 1938. She spent some years in Harlem learning of its people and transmitting their yearnings, f...
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In the following essay, Holladay explores the depiction of racial, socioeconomic, and sexual prejudice in a small community in Ann Petry's “Miss Muriel.”
In Miss Muriel and Other ...
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In the following essay, Madden offers an overall critique of the short story “The Witness,” stressing Petry's insights into the plight of African-Americans living in primarily whi...
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In the following essay, Lattin says that readers should re-evaluate Petry's works as important critiques of traditional American values.
Ann Petry's fiction too often has been mutilated ...
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In the following essay, Washington analyzes the style, structure, and characterization in the stories in Miss Muriel and Other Stories and urges more critical attention to Petry's works.
In the...
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In the following excerpt from a chapter entitled “Richard Wright and the Triumph of Naturalism” in his full-length study of the history of the African-American novel, Bell claims that Pe...
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In the following essay, Weir discusses Petry's novel The Narrows, its indebtedness to Hawthorne, Wright, and other sources, and its clear portrayal of aspects of African-American culture.
When ...
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In the following essay, the author provides a post-structuralist reading of The Street, with emphasis on the ways in which Petry's protagonist casts the American Dream in the context of her own...
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In the following excerpt from an essay on Petry, Nella Larsen, and Zora Neale Hurston, Gebhard recommends The Street to high school readers who want to understand the search for black cultural identit...
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In the following essay, Holladay suggests that the social prejudices seen in the suitors in “Miss Muriel” may actually act as creative forces in a world in which various forms of prejudi...
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In the following essay, Wurst shows that Lutie, the protagonist of The Street, is doomed to failure when she tries to model herself on Benjamin Franklin, a white male with very different cultural valu...
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In the following essay, the author notes that Petry's effective use of sensory detail in The Street, unusual in a naturalistic novel, can be favorably compared with that of other masters of the...
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In the following essay, Thomson uses feminist theory to argue that the character of Mrs. Hedges in The Street repudiates most of the myths which relegate disabled women to passive roles.
One evening r...
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In the following essay, Brody dwells on the image of the black female in “The Winding Sheet,” applying black feminist theory to concepts of race and gender.
When do we start to see image...
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In the following essay, Holladay deconstructs the narrative of Country Place, stressing the interdependence of the characters and the illusory nature of their reality.
Although William Faulkner is the...
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In the following essay, Harris urges more critical attention to Tituba of Salem Village and explores the ways in which Tituba and other characters adopt and respond to authority.
When we think of the ...
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In the following essay, a black feminist critic urges a re-evaluation of Petry's The Narrows, a novel the critic thinks has been underrated by male critics since the 1950s.
First the conundrum:...
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In this chapter from his full-length, deconstructive study of the concept of “value” as it applies to racial blackness, Barrett explores the symbolic value of Lutie's singing voic...
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In the following essay, Barry notes that Petry has a cyclical view of history but at the same time a sense of optimism even in the face of racism, classism, and sexism.
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In interviews and writings fr...
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Critical Essay by Arna Bontemps
There is no longer any doubt about it. The author of "The Street," "Country Place," and now "The Narrows" is a neighborhood no...
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Critical Essay by George R. Adams
One of the most noteworthy examples of sociology transformed into art is Ann Petry's story, "In Darkness and Confusion" (1947), which recreates t...
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Critical Essay by Arthur P. Davis
[The Street] follows the tradition of hard-hitting social commentary which characterized the Richard Wright school of naturalistic protest writing. The Street is perh...
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Ann (Lane) Petry
