Born in 1908, the son of a Mississippi sharecropper, Wright lived in a world where Jim Crow was more than a proper noun; it was a verb. His was a world of fear, and he carried this fear for all his days. Wright, however, did not allow his fear to best him. Fear was his tool, writing his craft, and words his weapon. Here, reenactments of his work are mixed with interviews with those who respect him, revealing Wright as the social critic that he was.