51 pages • 1 hour read
Ann PetryThe Street
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1946A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Powerlessness in the Face of Structural Racism
Lutie cannot get ahead, despite her best efforts and relentless work ethic, a fact she blames on the inherent racism in American society. This often manifests in the form of a lack of employment opportunities. Her estranged husband, Jim, was unable to find work and became restless and angry. Her father, Pops, is forced to bootleg liquor to make money. Lutie herself finds work in the home of a white family, but the unremitting hours cost her marriage. Lutie feels as though she has no agency in her life, and that all her efforts will come to naught because of factors outside her control. She resists investing fully in her dreams, such as becoming a nightclub singer, because she correctly assumes that these will be taken away from her.
This powerless extends to other black characters, as well. Min has spent much of her adult life bouncing from one man’s home to the next, unable to find a place to call her own. She seeks assistance from the supernatural in the form of Prophet David, because she knows she has no true recourse for help in her everyday life. Boots relies on Junto to help him escape a life of service and destitution, and though Boots has made plenty of money as a bandleader in Junto’s venues, he is still subservient to the white man. Jones lives a lonely, isolated life, scorned by almost all who know him. He only wields power over the child, Bub, whom he manipulates and turns in to white authorities in order to get back at Lutie. Mrs. Hedges has the closest thing to a partnership with Junto, though she maintains this by exploiting black women for prostitution.
After coming face to face with her powerlessness throughout the novel, Lutie finally lashes out at the novel’s end, when she beats Boots to death. Boots, in his attempt to first proposition Lutie on behalf of Junto, then sexually assault her himself, represents all the forces that have suppressed Lutie throughout her life. She reacts violently to a world that has denied her a fair shot because of her skin color, and, to a lesser extent, her gender. Ultimately, this is a fruitless act, and she’s forced to flee to a new location, likely for a life with just as few opportunities as the one she left.
The Objectification of African-Americans
Most of the African-American characters are regarded as little more than objects to be manipulated by white society, and even by each other. They are treated less as humans than as tools that provide a means to an end. Their humanity is most often not affirmed nor acknowledged.
Lutie is desired by almost every man who sees her, and most of the male characters in the novel—Boots, Junto, and Jones—concoct plans to attain her, with no regard for what she wants. They prey upon her dreams and family in order to satisfy their desires. Lutie’s grandmother warns her about white men’s desire for black women, saying that “they all got a itch and a urge” (45) to take black women to bed.
Boots faced this objectification when he worked as a train porter and was constantly ordered around and talked down to by white passengers. He also survived as an itinerant musician, playing parties and speakeasies, during which white people would insult him and force him to sing and dance for money.
The few white characters in the novel serve to reinforce this idea of objectification, referring to African-Americans in sub-human terms. Bub’s teacher, who ostensibly could be seen as devoting her life to helping underprivileged African-American youth, instead despises them, comparing them to “worms” (330) who “frightened her” (330). She wishes desperately for another job teaching polite white children. In addition, the detectives who inform Lutie about Bub’s arrest comment that her apartment building is “not fit for pigs to live in” (386).
Of note is that this objectification runs so deep that African-Americans even do it to themselves, such as the way Mrs. Hedges prostitutes young black women out of her apartment, and constantly tries to set Lutie up with Junto. Societal expectations have become so ingrained within the oppressed African-American community that some can’t help but replicate the way they’ve been treated by whites.
The Instability and Unreliability of Men
Lutie’s struggle is compounded by the fact that she essentially has to go at it alone, with almost no help from the men in her world. Her husband, Jim, unable to find work, feels inadequate when Lutie leaves home to work with the Chandlers, and attempts to regain his masculinity through an adulterous affair. She loves him despite this: “If even once he had put his arms around her and said he was sorry and asked her to forgive him, she would have stayed” (54), but his ego will not allow him to, and so Lutie leaves. This betrayal informs the rest of her interactions with male characters, who reveal greedy, manipulative, and selfish behaviors.
The men’s undependable behavior stems from both intrinsic characteristics as well as societal reasons. Jim can’t find a job, blaming “God damn white people” (30) for the lack of opportunity. Lutie’s father, Pops, sells bootleg alcohol as a means to support himself, becoming an alcoholic himself in the process. Both Jones and Mr. Chandler’s brother suffer from some form of undiagnosed mental illness; the former has misanthropic and violent tendencies, while the latter commits suicide in front of the whole family.
Men who are in a position to help Lutie, including Boots and Junto, do not have purely altruistic motives. Each uses Lutie’s financial vulnerability as a means to exploit her. Even the men who cross Lutie’s path for just a moment are portrayed in negative light: the talent manager, Mr. Crosse, seeks sexual favors in return for career advancement, and the lawyer she finds to help her free Bub is willing to rip her off for $200. With absolutely no supportive and loving men in her life, it is no wonder that Lutie has become cynical about the world in general and men specifically. Even little Bub, growing up without a male role model, has his kindness and innocence exploited and is likely to end up following the same path as the adult males he encounters as youth.
The behavior of men becomes an especially sharp contrast when compared to the female characters. Mrs. Hedges may be running a brothel, but she still seems to possess a sense of morals and ethics, and keeps a close eye on the street and her neighbors. Min absorbs the abuse of Jones and the other men she’s lived with, but has a keen sense of self-preservation and never attempts to hurt others in response. Lutie does as best she can for herself and her son, despite the knowledge that most every man she comes across is not to be trusted.
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By Ann Petry
