Résumé de texte

Hello Doudou,

j'ai fait un résumé, peut être un peu trop long, je ne sais pas, et sans doute des fautes avec...

"The story takes place in Harlem, in the 1920’s .
Elizabeth came to see her boyfriend, Richard. He has just been arrested unjustly, for robbery. When she saw him, she was panic-stricken. He had been beaten up, ill-treated. Physical violence is underlined with phrases as “swellings” “welt” “hardly walk”. We can think that the legal system works efficiently because Richard is to be tried and sentenced immediately. But, the writer denounces the unfairness of the system. In fact, Richard get arrested for his skin colour…He waited the train, when three coloured boys were running away because they stole from a shop. They were pursued by two whites. Richard was trapped because, for this whites, they are all look alike. At the Station house Richard proclaimed his innocence: he asked one of the thiefs to corroborate his testimony, and when the store owner came, hopeful, he tried to relax, thinking that the store owner couldn’t say that it was there. But, the owner of the store, approved with the policeman, the thiefs were all here. Richard protested needlessly, because the man judges blacks collectively. “You black bastards” “You’re all the same” reveals the man’s deep-rooted prejudice. Even if Richard realised he was a scapegoat, he kept on rebelling: he refused to sign a confession if he wasn’t guilty. From there, a police man insulted him of “son-of a bitch” and began to beaten him “hitting him suddenly across the head”.

The writer wants the reader to feel party for Richard who is faced with hardships. The reader feels outraged when Richard is arrested just because African American were judged collectively and when he is brutally beaten up by the police. He draws up an indictment toward the American police and exposes the unfairness of the system."


Merci.