The Outsider by Richard Wright
“We Communists do not admit any subjectivity in human life,” Gil said with a slow, even smile, as though proud that he could utter such a horrible statement with such lightmindedness.
“I see,” Cross said, striving to keep his voice neutral. He was seething with resentment at Gil’s effrontery. Who in the hell does he think he is? He had to brace himself to keep from taking issue not only with Gil’s statement but with the whole attitude toward life implied in it. Cross felt himself slowly coming awake, feeling the real world about him. Here was a challenge the measure of which might meet his needs…Keep still, he told himself.
“Do you know anything about the revolutionary movement?”
“I know it sketchily in general outline, from 1917 onwards -”
“Where did you pick it up?”
“From books, of course. What do you think?” Cross had difficulty keeping irritation out of his voice.
“Accounts written by counter-revolutionary historians, no doubt,” Gil pronounced placidly. He brought out his pipe and began to fill it leisurely with an aromatic tobacco.
Cross had come by his account of the Russian Revolution from the pens of Russian Bolsheviks themselves, but he did not bother to correct Gil’s assumption. He sensed that accuracy was no the point here. Gil was trying to impress him, not with learning, but with some attitude of scorn so deep that argument was futile against it. Instead, he took advantage of Gil’s silence to observe Eva who sat with her shapely nyloned knees close together and regarded him with wide, enigmatic eyes. When his gaze met hers, she smiled and looked off. She seemed tense, yet rigidly contained. She was a fragile girl of about twenty-four; her attitude was so distracted that one could feel that she would never speak frankly what was really on her mind. Despite this, she seemed kind, impulsive. Her eyes were a clear hazel; her nose small and straight; and her mouth, which was only slightly rouged, was almost severe in its sharpness. The overall aspect of her face, despite the shadow of a smile the flitted over it now and then, was one of tortured, organized concentration. Cross wondered how on earth had she come to be married to a coarse, inhuman character like Blount. Cross now shifted his gaze to Gil and was chagrined to find that Gil had been observing his observation of Eva. Gil smiled tolerantly and Cross found himself boiling with rage. He thinks I’ve never met a white girl before…
Something decisive was transpiring in him regarding Gil. He knew that Gild did not take his inner life into account he felt compelled to do the same with Gil. This damn thing’s catching, he told himself. You have to descend to their level if you are to deal with them…There’s no other way out…But he really liked this; there was an absoluteness about it that appealed to him, excited him. To grapple with Gil would involve a total mobilization of all the resources of his personality, and the conflict would be religious in its intensity.
Finished this book a few days ago and I’m now going back and looking over all the shit that I bookmarked/highlighted.
This whole scene between Cross and Blount is intense and probably one of the best written confrontations that I’ve ever read. I don’t want to give anything else away, so I’ll let you go pick up a copy and find out what happens if you’re interested lol.