Crooks Monologue
Loneliness is a disease. It crawls up on you slowly, tearing you up and making you go insane. It is a weird thing, loneliness, havin’ a friend is a blessin’ but worst of all, once this disease infects you, there is nothin’ you can do about it. Well, nothin’ if you’re black.
As a Negro people stay well away from me an’ don’t want to know a thing ‘bout me. I jus’ have to stay in my room, my private room, where I would have my privacy but nobody to talk to.
I had it all though, a nice family, education and our own piece of lan’. We didn’t have to do this tedious job of tendin’ the horses. I’m sick of it now. Back then there would be a new job ev’ry day. But best of all, I’d play with children. They were white kids though, so my father didn’t want me to play with them. I didn’t get it then, but it all makes sense now. Those white people kicked us of the lan’. They said my father ‘ad killed somebody. So what do they do? They kill ‘im. No fair trial like these whites would get. It jus’ made me hate ev’ry white.
