"Come Out the Wilderness" is a 1965 short story by James Baldwin

James Baldwin (writer)

James Arthur Baldwin was an American novelist, essayist, playwright, poet, and social critic.Baldwin's essays, for instance "Notes of a Native Son" , explore palpable yet unspoken intricacies of racial, sexual, and class distinctions in Western societies, most notably in mid-20th century America,...

, taken from the short story collection, Going to Meet the Man

Going to Meet the Man

Going to Meet the Man, published in 1965, is a short-story collection by American writer James Baldwin. The book is dedicated "for Beauford Delaney." It covers many topics related to anti-Black racism in American society, as well as the creative process, jazz, drug addiction, family relationships,...

.

Plot summary

Ruth is living with Paul, who has taken to coming back home in the wee hours of night, putting forth that they are not married and that he tells her everything. She feels rejuvenated when Mr Davis not only suggests making her his own secretary and increasing her salary, but also takes her out to lunch. However, as he suggests taking her out at night, she feels confused and emotional, and they return to work. Later, since Paul called her earlier to say he would be away at some art gallery with Cosmo, she goes to a bar and thinks back to an ex-boyfriend who had treated her like a slavegirl on a farm. In tears, she walks out of the bar, feeling disoriented.

Characters

• Ruth, a young black woman. She works for a life insurance company.
• Paul, a painter, Ruth's boyfriend. He is white.
• Cosmo, another painter, a friend of Paul's.
• Arthur, Ruth's ex-boyfriend, a clarinet
  Clarinet
  The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...
  
   player. She left her family home in the South with him. They lived together for four years.
• Mr Davis, the other black man at Ruth's company.
• Ruth's father
• Ruth's brother. He came upon her as she was about to make love when she was seventeen, and beat up the boy and called her names; they didn't talk after that.

Main themes

• racism
• Mr Davis speaks in Ebonics
  African American Vernacular English
  African American Vernacular English —also called African American English; less precisely Black English, Black Vernacular, Black English Vernacular , or Black Vernacular English —is an African American variety of American English...
  
  with Ruth, strengthening their mutual sense of identity.