1928 - Again he is joined by his
mother and brother. Richard begins working in the Chicago post office
but fails the medical exam due to undernourishment. 1910 - Brother Leon Alan Wright born September 24.
1911-1912 - Ella Wright leaves the farm with her children and goes to Natchez to live with her family. Richard accidentally sets fire to house of his grandparents, the Wilsons.
1913-1914 - Nathaniel and Ella move with their children to Memphis. Nathaniel leaves his family to live with another woman.
1915-1916 - Richard enters school at the Howe Institute, Memphis, in September. Ella becomes ill and the children are placed in an orphanage for a short time. After Richard spends the summer in Jackson, Mississippi, with his maternal grandparents, Ella moves with her sons to Elaine, Arkansas, to live with her sister and brother-in-law, Maggie and Silas Hopkins. Richard becomes close to Silas.
1917 - Uncle Silas, a relatively prosperous builder and saloon-keeper, is murdered by whites. No arrests are made, and Aunt Maggie, Ella, and the children flee to West Helena, Arkansas.
1918-1919 - Richard is forced to leave school to find work. Ella's deteriorating health culminates in a stroke, leaving her paralyzed. The children are separated, with Richard going to live with an uncle and aunt in Greenwood, Mississippi. Unhappy, he returns to Jackson, Mississippi.
1920 - Richard attends the Seventh-Day Adventist school taught by his Aunt Addie and rebels against its strict rules.
1921 - Richard transfers to the public Jim Hill School, where he excels academically and gains friends.
1922 - Richard works at various jobs after school and during summer, including newsboy (where he is able to read) and secretary/accountant to an insurance agent (allowing him to travel around Mississippi). Richard is dismayed by the illiteracy and lack of education he sees among African-Americans. His income from jobs allows Richard to afford books, food, and clothing for the first time.
1923-1924 - He attends Smith-Robertson Junior High. His first short story, "The Voodoo of Hell's Half-Acre," reportedly was published in the Jackson Southern Register.
1925 - Richard graduates from Smith-Robertson as valedictorian. He refuses to deliver the graduation ceremony speech prepared by the principal and instead delivers his own. He leaves Jackson for Memphis.
1927 - His mother and brother join Richard in Memphis. Spurred by author H.L. Mencken, he begins to read American naturalist writers. In December, Richard, with Aunt Maggie, moves to the South Side of Chicago.
1928 - Again he is joined by his
mother and brother. Richard begins working in the Chicago post office
but fails the medical exam due to undernourishment.
1929 - Richard passes the Postal Service physical and returns to work. He moves his family into a four room apartment where he can write in relative comfort.
1930 - Chicago's "South Side" sinks into the Depression. Richard's hours are cut at post office.
1931 - He publishes short story "Superstition" in Abbott's Monthly Magazine, however, the African-American-owned magazine fails before Richard is paid.
1933 - Richard joins the Chicago John
Reed Club and writes revolutionary poetry for Left Front. He joins
the Communist Party and is hired to supervise a youth club organized
to counter juvenile delinquency among African-Americans on the South
Side.
1935 - Richard continues publishing poetry, tries unsuccessfully to sell his first novel (Lawd Today!), expands his acquaintance among left-wing writers, and is hired by the Federal Writer's Project. Lawd Today! would eventually be published 28 years later in 1963.
1936 - Richard is active in the African-American South Side Writer's Group; he publishes the story "Big Boy Leaves Home" in The New Caravan.
1937 - Richard turns down a full-time postal position in Chicago. He moves to New York to write for the Daily Worker while continuing to work with the Writer's Project. His "Fire and Cloud" wins first prize of $500 in a contest sponsored by Story magazine.
1938 - Uncle Tom's Children appears and receives good reviews.
1939 - Wright marries Dhima Rose Meadman, a white ballet dancer.
1940 - Native Son is published, becomes a best-seller, and receives many favorable reviews. Uncle Tom's Children is reissued in an expanded edition. His first marriage fails. He attempts to reconcile with his father.
1941 - Wright marries Ellen Poplar, a Communist organizer from Brooklyn. The play Native Son, adapted by Wright with Paul Green, is produced on Broadway by Orson Welles and John Houseman. Wright collaborates with Edwin Rosskam on Twelve Million Black Voices.
1942 - Daughter Julia is born. Wright withdraws from the Communist Party without publicity.
1944 - Wright's break with Communist Pary becomes public with the publication of "I Tried to be a Communist" in The Atlantic Monthly and "The Man Who Lived Underground" published in Cross Section.
1945 - Black Boy, a Book-of-the-Month Club selection, is
published in March, receives excellent reviews, and becomes a
best-seller.
1946 - Wright travels to France in May as a guest of the French government, is well received by French intellectuals, and stays until December.
1947 - Returning to New York, Wright encounters continuing racism. Wright, Ellen and Julia return to Paris, where they become permanent expatriates.
1949 - A second daughter, Rachel, is born in January. Wright writes the film version of Native Son and travels for filming.
1950 - The film Native Son is shown in Buenos Aires, New York, Venice, and elsewhere.
1952 - Wright refuses to return to the United States citing risk of subpoena by an anti-Communist congressional investigating committee.
1953 - The Outsider is published in March to mixed reviews.
Wright travels throughout Africa's Gold Coast.
1954 - Wright travels in Spain; he publishes Black Power and Savage Holiday.
1955 - He visits Spain again and attends the Bandung Conference.
1956 - The Color Curtain: A Report on the Bandung Conference is published in English in March, having appeared in French three months earlier.
1957 - Pagan Spain and White Man, Listen! appear.
1958 - The Long Dream is published in October, but reviews are mostly unfavorable.
1959 - Daddy Goodness, adapted by Wright from Louis Spain's Pappa Bon Dieu, is produced in Paris. Wright tries his hand at haiku.
1960 - The Long Dream, adapted from the novel, has only a week's run on Broadway. Wright dies of an apparent heart attack on November 28.
1991 - The Library of America publishes a two-volume edition of Wright's work, including Lawd Today!, Uncle Tom's Children, Native Son, "How 'Bigger' Was Born", Black Boy (American Hunger), and The Outsider in their original "author's" versions, restoring cuts and various changes made by publishers and others.