[The Street] follows the tradition of hard-hitting social commentary which characterized the Richard Wright school of naturalistic protest writing. The Street is perhaps the best novel to come from the followers of Wright. [Miss Petry's] last full-length adult novel, The Narrows …, depicts Negro life in a small New England city, a subject not often treated in black writing. (p. 193)

A depressing work, The Street follows the thesis implied by this type of naturalistic writing: namely, that the black poor in the ghetto do not have much of a chance to live decent and meaningful lives, to say nothing of happy lives….

In an article that appeared in The Crisis Miss Petry tells us her objectives in this work:

… my aim is to show how simply and easily the environment can change the course of a person's life….

I try to show why the Negro has a high crime...