Manchild in the Promised Land

Analyze Claude’s relationship with his parents. What does he think of their core values? How does he depict the generational divide that separates them? What do they have in common? How does his depiction of them exemplify his feelings about authority?

The novel has received criticism about Claude’s use of racial, religious, and gender slurs. How do you think this language affects the novel?

Choose a specific location in the novel and analyze Brown’s depiction of it. Who goes there? What activities take place there? How does Claude feel about it? What is that location’s overall role in the story?

In an imaginative essay, write an epilogue from Pimp’s point of view. How do you think his description of his and Claude’s childhood and relationship might differ from Claude’s description? Using textual clues from the novel, think about how Pimp might feel about his imprisonment and what he might plan to do upon his release.

Choose a real historical event, person, or idea that Claude encounters—for example, the assassination of Patrice Lumumba—and analyze its role in the narrative.

Some scholars have noted the repetitive nature of the novel’s structure: not only does Claude recycle particular words and phrases, but the same events seem to happen over and over (for example, Claude being arrested, briefly incarcerated, and released). What effect do you think this has on the overall narrative?

In The Way of the World: The Bildungsroman in European Culture (London: Verso, 1987), literary critic Franco Moretti claims that the main conflict in the bildungsroman comes from its overvaluation of youth and progress: This, he argues, clashes with traditional depictions of happiness that usually come at the end of a story. Do you think Claude ultimately finds happiness? Or do you think that he simply has too much growing left to do and will inevitably come into conflict with forces of authority?

Examining scenes in which he listens to or plays music, analyze music’s role in Claude’s psychological and social development. Look at specific terms he uses to describe how music makes him feel, and think about the material ways it changes his life. Why does music have this effect on him when nothing else does?