Survival and success are closely related in the novel. Families like the Malones must succeed in employment, for example, in order to provide basic necessities and pay rent; during the Great Depression, being unsuccessful in retaining a job threatened not only one’s pride and emotional well-being, but the health and survival of family members. Father’s choice to go job-searching in Flint underscores the urgency of his failure to find work. On a more symbolic level, the importance of success in the Joe Louis fight connects to survival via Father’s words: “Hitler and his boys have said that no black man can ever beat a white man, that we […] and all our neighbors are where we are because we deserve to be here” (121). As America begins to grapple with the potential threat of fascism with Adolf Hitler at the ideology’s helm, Louis’s failure to beat the German Max Schmeling symbolizes the threat to survival as well. Throughout the novel, characters make decisions and go to extreme lengths to fight for success and survival despite the difficult circumstances posed by the Great Depression and racism.

Mrs. Needham takes the fight for success seriously when she tells Deza, “I believe from the bottom of my heart that if we lose you, we’ve lost this country.