Characters

The two characters of “Tales of Simple: Temptation” by Langston Hughes are flat (do not change throughout the story), and their characterization is constructed through dialogue (they reveal themselves and their ideas through direct speech).

The narrator

The unnamed narrator’s outer characterization reveals that he is an educated African-American man, as indicated by expressions like “we colored people” (p. 126, l. 3) and more complex phrases and ideas such as “color complex” (p. 127, l. 5) or “you’ve been conditioned entirely by our environment” (p. 128, ll. 15-16).

Inner characterization

Unlike Simple, the narrator knows more about the Bible and understands that the biblical text is mostly symbolic:

‘No,’ said I, ‘because it wasn’t until Genesis 2 and 7 until God ‘formed man of the dust of the Earth and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul’. His name was Adam. Then He took one of Adam’s ribs and made a woman.’ (p. 126, ll. 18-21)

The fact that he cites directly from the Bible suggests that the narrator might have studied it more formally, but nothing is mentioned explicitly in the text.

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Simple

Like the narrator, Simple is only presented through dialogue. According to his outer characterization, he is a poor, Christian, African-American man, living in Harlem. The language he uses which includes slang and grammatical errors also suggests that he is less well-educated than the narrator: “ ‘When the Lord said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light, what I want to know is where was us colored people?’ ” (p. 126, ll. 1-2)

Inner characterization

Simple’s inner characterization presents him as a simple man with rudimentary knowledge of the Bible (he does not know that light came before people), and who takes biblical stories literally. Furthermore, he imagines the first people lived as if they were in modern society, with “Colored People’s Time” (p. 126, l. 15) and modern attitudes.

Simple initially believes that colored people missed the time when God created light and this is why they have a different skin color. His assumption is naïve, but it illustrates that he struggles to understand why black people and white people are considered different.

When the narrator explains to him that people were created after light, he is distrustful at first. However, he then goes on to argue that Adam and Eve must have been white and they are responsible for humanity’s problems. The fact that he does not believe black people are capable of falling into temptation suggests that he thinks black people have stronger moral principles than white people:

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