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The present paper is an investigation of the various echoes in The Autobiography of an Ex-Colured Man of what W.E.B. Du Bois called black "double-consciousness." J.W. Johnson, the author of the fictio...nal autobiography, narrates the life of a black man who passes the color line between black and white. Du Bois's "double-consciouness" is reflected in the sense of duality not only in the narrative structure of The Autobiography but also in the characterization of the protagonist-narrator. The narrator weaves a success story of self-realization through his musical creativity, while his unconscious desire to be a white man undercuts it. His encounter with a lynching makes him give up his alleged ambition to bring honor and fame to the black race by creating black music deeply rooted in folk culture and tradition. Instead, he finally chooses to be white and engages money-making, thereby acquiring "a mess of pottage." Johnson gives this account of the ex-colored man in the form of simulated autobiography. This act of telling seems to be a kind of ritual and it suggests that he wishes vicariously to be free from the very qualities that he seems to have in common with the ex-colored man. By so doing perhaps Johnson attempts to make a new start for integrating his own "double-consciousness" as a black.show more
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