He knew that the moment he allowed what his life meant to enter fully into his consciousness, he would either kill himself or someone else. So he denied himself and acted tough.

The sentence sketches a psychology of repression under extreme social pressure: the character senses that fully acknowledging the meaning of his life—its constraints, humiliations, or injustices—would make existence unbearable and push him toward catastrophic violence, inward (suicide) or outward (homicide). “Denied himself” suggests a deliberate numbing or self-erasure, while “acted tough” points to a performed hardness used as armor. In Wright’s work, such toughness often functions as a survival strategy in environments where vulnerability is punished and where rage has few safe outlets. The quote highlights how emotional suppression can masquerade as strength while actually signaling desperation and trapped agency.