The book touches on many different themes. Racism, morality, confusion, and mainstream acceptance are just a few I can think of. But which one did King really intend to convey as the main theme for the book?
While most nonfiction books aren’t really themed, this one seems different. As we’ve discussed a bunch of times already (too many times), this book takes a historical event and approaches it in a heavily researched and almost dramaticized way. Because it’s crafted this way, it deals with the harshness and reality of racism during the forties. It also takes us through how commonplace incidents like this, where young black men were accused of crimes with little to no evidence pointing to their guilt, and were rushed through unfair trials with all-white juries and executed, unless they were lynched by vicious mobs first. To me, it seemed as though King was just trying to inform colorfully, with highly descriptive language and graphic pictures throughout the book. But it also seemed like he wanted the reader to take out of it the fact that so many people just went along with that, being told that blacks were simply inferior. One idea I had was that he may be trying to show how horrible and cruel people can be just because of a deeply rooted prejudice, and how, in the case of Sheriff McCall, they may literally not care about what they’re doing or see how bad it is. It’s not really a theme, but it’s definitely a thought that he may have been trying to convey along with the recapping of the historical event. Do you guys think he was trying to convey a theme at all, or just telling this story?
I'm not sure about an explicit theme but I do like the idea you bring out about dramatized a non fiction book. His writing makes something that actually happened all the more lifelike. I think one theme he could be pushing is this idea of a literal struggle of good and evil. While in other works e.g.. Inferno, the line between good and evil seems to be drawn firmly on the line of light and dark, of black and white, King seems to show us that no one is perfectly good or evil, (even though McCall may seem absolutely evil). Guilty parties show signs of good, and innocent parties show flaws. While McCall seems to be beyond redemption, there were small glimpses of him trying to uphold justice throughout the book. While the Groveland four were completely innocent of the crimes they were accused of, one did technically assault Willie Padgett. The key is while most characters seem to be good or evil, none is full encapsulated by either term.
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