Black Buck

This book intentionally blurs the lines between literary fiction and nonfiction categories like business and self-development. Do you think that Darren/Buck is a character to emulate in real life? Are the lessons set forth in this “cautionary memoir” ones that we should attempt to implement? How should we think about the relationship between real life and fiction in this text?

At the end of the book, Darren claims, “I am locked up in a cage but I never been freer” (380). Earlier, he noted, “Nothing in life is free, especially freedom” (346). What do you think “freedom” means, as described in these quotes and elsewhere in the book? What kind of “freedom” does Darren have, and what is the price that he has paid for it?

Throughout the novel, the idea of what it means to “be yourself” arises. How does the novel as a whole represent the relationship between “self” and “change?” How does it differentiate between healthy self-development and becoming unrecognizable to loved ones?

The idea of “winning” by “fixing the game” comes up repeatedly in the text. How does the novel define “the game?” What constitutes “winning?” Darren also adds that winning is “one of the most dangerous things you can ever do” (148). What do you think he means by this? What evidence is there in the novel that winning is dangerous?

After initially resisting it, Darren eventually embraces the name “Buck.” Considering the evidence in text and the multiple meanings and connotations of the term “buck,” what do you think Darren’s choice to adopt this name represents? Is he a “broken Buck” (113), as Clyde claims, or has he somehow “bucked the system” (379) and reappropriated the name in defiance of the negative connotations it implies?

Askaripour’s Black characters repeatedly reference the legacy of slavery to describe present-day racial inequities of power and access to opportunity. How does the novel suggest that these differences in the availability of opportunities by race can be addressed? How might differences in perspectives on what “achievement” looks like be reframed by looking at them through the historical lens the book suggests?

The novel’s references to slavery describe specific racial hierarchies under white supremacy, but they also refer to the exploitative conditions of work itself. What relationship between work and slavery does the novel represent? Does it suggest the possibility of non-exploitative employer/employee relations, or does the power imbalance persist?

The novel describes selling as a superpower, a New Age-flavored self-empowerment practice for visualizing and manifesting success, and a hostile activity fueled by the rage of those who perform it. Write a manifesto for salespeople based on the evidence in Black Buck, outlining their mission and objectives. How would you reconcile the disparate evidence about salesmanship it contains?