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| passing by nella larsen full text: Passing Nella Larsen, 2025-12-01 Passing is a profound exploration of racial identity, societal expectations, and the intricate dynamics of friendship and betrayal. Nella Larsen delves into the complexities of race and colorism in 1920s America, portraying a society where appearances are carefully curated, and personal identity is often sacrificed for social acceptance. Through the intertwined lives of Clare Kendry and Irene Redfield, the novel examines how race can be both a barrier and a means of survival, as well as how it influences personal choices and relationships. Since its publication, Passing has been acclaimed for its nuanced portrayal of identity and the tensions surrounding race and class. The novel's exploration of these themes has inspired academic discussions and adaptations in various forms, including films and theatrical productions. Its characters, particularly Clare and Irene, have become central to debates on identity, autonomy, and the pressures of societal norms. The novel remains relevant today due to its incisive critique of social constructs and its portrayal of the personal and collective struggles tied to race. By addressing issues of belonging, self-perception, and the cost of conformity, Passing continues to resonate as a powerful commentary on the human experience in the face of societal expectations. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Quicksand Nella Larsen, 2025-02-28 Quicksand by Nella Larsen is a profound novel that delves into the complexities of race and identity in the 1920s. The story revolves around Helga Crane, a mixed-race woman who is searching for a sense of belonging and fulfillment amidst the restrictive social constructs of her time. Helga's journey takes her from her upbringing in the black middle class in the North, to the vibrant artistic community of Harlem, to the rural Southern town of her ancestry, and finally to the exotic land of Denmark. Throughout her travels, she grapples with the dichotomy of her racial identity and the expectations placed upon her by the people around her, leading to a tumultuous journey of self-discovery. The novel opens with Helga Crane, an educator at a Southern school for black children, feeling stifled by the constraints of her job and the societal norms of the black community. Driven by a desire to find her true place in the world, she moves to Harlem, seeking the cultural richness of the Harlem Renaissance. However, she quickly becomes disillusioned with the materialism and shallow relationships she encounters there. Her search for authenticity leads her to Copenhagen, where she hopes to find a connection with her white Danish heritage. Initially, she is embraced by the avant-garde artistic community, but she soon realizes that her racial identity is as much of an issue in Europe as it is in America. Despite her attempts to assimilate, she remains an outsider, and her romantic involvement with a married artist further complicates her search for belonging. Returning to the Southern town where her mother was born, Helga experiences a sense of kinship with the black community but is also faced with the stark realities of Jim Crow laws and the deep-seated racism that pervades American society. Her time in the South is marked by a passionate love affair with a minister named Dr. Anderson, who represents a potential escape from her past. However, their relationship is fraught with the same issues of identity and conformity that she has been wrestling with throughout her life. Feeling trapped by her choices and her identity, Helga ultimately marries a man named James Vayle, a fellow teacher from the North who offers her stability and a respite from her tumultuous past. Yet, their marriage is plagued by her inability to fully embrace the domestic role expected of her, as well as James's infidelity and his inability to understand her inner turmoil. As the story unfolds, Helga's journey becomes a metaphor for the struggles of individuals caught between two worlds, unable to find a stable footing in either. The novel delivers a poignant commentary on the fluidity of identity and the quest for authenticity in a society that seeks to categorize and contain. Larsen's vivid portrayal of Helga's internal conflict is mirrored in the external landscapes she traverses, each offering a unique perspective on race and identity. Quicksand is a powerful exploration of the intersections of race, class, and gender during the era of the New Negro. The characters are complex and multifaceted, reflecting the multitude of experiences faced by those navigating the complexities of the time. The prose is rich and evocative, painting a vivid picture of the various settings and the tumultuous emotions of the protagonist. The novel is significant for its nuanced treatment of racial passing and the psychological toll it takes on individuals who are forced to navigate the boundaries of identity. Helga's experiences highlight the pain and isolation that result from a lifelong quest to find a place where she truly fits in. Through her story, Larsen critiques the limitations imposed by a society that refuses to acknowledge the fluidity of identity and the human need for acceptance. Quicksand is a timeless piece of literature that resonates with readers who grapple with the complexities of their own identity. It is a compelling narrative that challenges readers to consider the societal pressures that shape our perceptions of ourselves and others. The book's themes remain relevant today, as discussions of race, belonging, and the search for identity continue to evolve. Larsen's work is a poignant reminder of the enduring human desire for connection and authenticity amidst the ever-shifting sands of social constructs. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Return of the Soldier Rebecca West, 1918 |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Odd Women George Gissing, 2010-10-01 One of the acknowledged masterpieces of Victorian-era literary realism, George Gissing's novel The Odd Women portrays the plight of unmarried women in nineteenth-century England, probing the question of the financial and psychological well-being of those who were not able to find suitable matches. Recognized by critics as an early feminist text, this novel is a must-read for fans of historical -- and socially significant -- fiction. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Female Subjects in Black and White Elizabeth Abel, Barbara Christian, Helene Moglen, 2023-09-01 This landmark collaboration between African American and white feminists goes to the heart of problems that have troubled feminist thinking for decades. Putting the racial dynamics of feminist interpretation center stage, these essays question such issues as the primacy of sexual difference, the universal nature of psychoanalytic categories, and the role of race in the formation of identity. They offer new ways of approaching African American texts and reframe our thinking about the contexts, discourses, and traditions of the American cultural landscape. Calling for the racialization of whiteness and claiming that psychoanalytic theory should make room for competing discourses of spirituality and diasporic consciousness, these essays give shape to the many stubborn incompatibilities—as well as the transformative possibilities—between white feminist and African American cultural formations. Bringing into conversation a range of psychoanalytic, feminist, and African-derived spiritual perspectives, these essays enact an inclusive politics of reading. Often explosive and always provocative, Female Subjects in Black and White models a new cross-racial feminism. This landmark collaboration between African American and white feminists goes to the heart of problems that have troubled feminist thinking for decades. Putting the racial dynamics of feminist interpretation center stage, these essays question such issues |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Beyond Passing Nella Larsen, 2021-08-31 Nella Larsen's 1929 novel Passing is hailed today as a significant literary work of Harlem Renaissance, though for several decades it, like all of her works, was out of print. As history rights a wrong and recommits Larsen's name to memory, it is beneficial to look at the other writings she published over her short career, collected here in Beyond Passing: The Further Writings of Nella Larsen. Contained within are her autobiographical novel Quicksand, and three short stories Freedom, The Wrong Man, and Sanctuary. With a growing number of titles under its Magna Releases banner, CSRC Storytelling promotes and provides positivity, power and presence in print, restoring literary classics across genres and making them newly accessible to modern readers. This collection of Nella Larsen stories is a CSRC Storytelling Magna Release. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Approaches to Teaching the Novels of Nella Larsen Jacquelyn Y. McLendon, 2016-09-01 Nella Larsen's novels Quicksand and Passing, published at the height of the Harlem Renaissance, fell out of print and were thus little known for many years. Now widely available and taught, Quicksand and Passing challenge conventional tragic mulatta and passing narratives. In part 1, Materials, of Approaches to Teaching the Novels of Nella Larsen, the editor surveys the canon of Larsen's writing, evaluates editions of her works, recommends secondary readings, and compiles a list of useful multimedia resources for teaching.The essays in part 2, Approaches, aim to help students better understand attitudes toward women and race during the Harlem Renaissance, the novels' relations to other artistic movements, and legal debates over racial identities in the early twentieth century. In so doing, contributors demonstrate how new and seasoned instructors alike might use Larsen's novels to explore a wide range of topics—including Larsen's short stories and letters, the relation between her writings and her biography, and the novels' discussion of gender and sexuality. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Passing and the Fictions of Identity Elaine K. Ginsberg, 1996-04-29 Passing refers to the process whereby a person of one race, gender, nationality, or sexual orientation adopts the guise of another. Historically, this has often involved black slaves passing as white in order to gain their freedom. More generally, it has served as a way for women and people of color to access male or white privilege. In their examination of this practice of crossing boundaries, the contributors to this volume offer a unique perspective for studying the construction and meaning of personal and cultural identities. These essays consider a wide range of texts and moments from colonial times to the present that raise significant questions about the political motivations inherent in the origins and maintenance of identity categories and boundaries. Through discussions of such literary works as Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom, The Autobiography of an Ex–Coloured Man, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, The Hidden Hand, Black Like Me, and Giovanni’s Room, the authors examine issues of power and privilege and ways in which passing might challenge the often rigid structures of identity politics. Their interrogation of the semiotics of behavior, dress, language, and the body itself contributes significantly to an understanding of national, racial, gender, and sexual identity in American literature and culture. Contextualizing and building on the theoretical work of such scholars as Judith Butler, Diana Fuss, Marjorie Garber, and Henry Louis Gates Jr., Passing and the Fictions of Identity will be of value to students and scholars working in the areas of race, gender, and identity theory, as well as U.S. history and literature. Contributors. Martha Cutter, Katharine Nicholson Ings, Samira Kawash, Adrian Piper, Valerie Rohy, Marion Rust, Julia Stern, Gayle Wald, Ellen M. Weinauer, Elizabeth Young |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Imitation of Life Fannie Hurst, 2004-12-07 A reprint of the 1933 classic novel, the basis for two film versions, with a new introduciton. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Brown Girls Daphne Palasi Andreades, 2022-01-04 NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • A “boisterous and infectious debut novel” (The Guardian) about a group of friends and their immigrant families from Queens, New York—a tenderly observed, fiercely poetic love letter to a modern generation of brown girls. “An acute study of those tender moments of becoming, this is an ode to girlhood, inheritance, and the good trouble the body yields.”—Raven Leilani, author of Luster FINALIST: The New American Voices Award, The Carol Shields Prize for Fiction, The VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, The New American Voices Award, The Center for Fiction First Novel Prize ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: PopSugar, Kirkus Reviews If you really want to know, we are the color of 7-Eleven root beer. The color of sand at Rockaway Beach when it blisters the bottoms of our feet. Color of soil . . . Welcome to Queens, New York, where streets echo with languages from all over the globe, subways rumble above dollar stores, trees bloom and topple over sidewalks, and the funky scent of the Atlantic Ocean wafts in from Rockaway Beach. Within one of New York City’s most vibrant and eclectic boroughs, young women of color like Nadira, Gabby, Naz, Trish, Angelique, and countless others, attempt to reconcile their immigrant backgrounds with the American culture in which they come of age. Here, they become friends for life—or so they vow. Exuberant and wild, together they roam The City That Never Sleeps, sing Mariah Carey at the tops of their lungs, yearn for crushes who pay them no mind—and break the hearts of those who do—all while trying to heed their mothers’ commands to be obedient daughters. But as they age, their paths diverge and rifts form between them, as some choose to remain on familiar streets, while others find themselves ascending in the world, beckoned by existences foreign and seemingly at odds with their humble roots. A blazingly original debut novel told by a chorus of unforgettable voices, Brown Girls illustrates a collective portrait of childhood, adulthood, and beyond, and is a striking exploration of female friendship, a powerful depiction of women of color attempting to forge their place in the world today. For even as the conflicting desires of ambition and loyalty, freedom and commitment, adventure and stability risk dividing them, it is to one another—and to Queens—that the girls ultimately return. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: We Love You, Charlie Freeman Kaitlyn Greenidge, 2017-01-31 A FINALIST FOR THE 2016 CENTER FOR FICTION FIRST NOVEL PRIZE AND THE 2017 YOUNG LIONS AWARD “A terrifically auspicious debut.” —Janet Maslin, The New York Times “Smart, timely and powerful . . . A rich examination of America’s treatment of race, and the ways we attempt to discuss and confront it today.” —The Huffington Post The Freeman family--Charles, Laurel, and their daughters, teenage Charlotte and nine-year-old Callie--have been invited to the Toneybee Institute to participate in a research experiment. They will live in an apartment on campus with Charlie, a young chimp abandoned by his mother. The Freemans were selected because they know sign language; they are supposed to teach it to Charlie and welcome him as a member of their family. But when Charlotte discovers the truth about the institute’s history of questionable studies, the secrets of the past invade the present in devious ways. The power of this shattering novel resides in Greenidge’s undeniable storytelling talents. What appears to be a story of mothers and daughters, of sisterhood put to the test, of adolescent love and grown-up misconduct, and of history’s long reach, becomes a provocative and compelling exploration of America’s failure to find a language to talk about race. “A magnificently textured, vital, visceral feat of storytelling . . . [by] a sharp, poignant, extraordinary new voice of American literature.” —Téa Obreht, author of The Tiger’s Wife |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Wreck of the Corsaire William Clark Russell, 1897 |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Collected works by Nella Larsen. Illustrated Nella Larsen, 2021-11-17 Nellallitea 'Nella' Larsen (first called Nellie Walker) was an American novelist of the Harlem Renaissance who wrote two novels and a few short stories. A revival of interest in her writing has occurred since the late 20th century, when issues of racial and sexual identity have been studied. Her works have been the subjects of numerous academic studies, and she is now widely lauded as not only the premier novelist of the Harlem Renaissance, but also an important figure in American modernism. Since the late 20th century, Passing has received renewed attention from scholars because of its close examination of racial and sexual ambiguities and liminal spaces. It has achieved canonical status in many American universities. Passing Quicksand The Wrong Man Freedom Sanctuary |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Passing Nella Larsen, 2021-11-18 Now a major Netflix film starring Tessa Thompson, Ruth Negga and Alexander SkarsgårdChildhood friends Clare and Irene are both light-skinned enough to pass as white, but only one of them has chosen to cross the colour line and live with the secret hanging over her. Clare believes she had successfully cut herself off from any connection to her past. Married to a racist white man who is oblivious to her African-American heritage, it is vital to her that the truth remains hidden. Irene is living as a middle-class Black woman with her husband and children in Harlem, taking on an important role in her community and embracing her origins.Both women are forced to re-examine their relationships with each other, with their husbands and with the truth, confronting their most closely guarded fears. Nella Larsen's powerful, tragic and acutely observant writing established her as a lodestar of America's Harlem Renaissance. Almost a century later, Passing and its nuanced exploration of the many fraught ways in which we seek to survive remains as timely as ever |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Nella Larsen Collection; Quicksand, Passing, Freedom, the Wrong Man, Sanctuary Nella Larsen, 2010-08-01 The Nella Larsen Collection is comprised of five Nella Larsen fiction including; Quicksand, Passing, Freedom, The Wrong Man, and Sanctuary. Quicksand, Larsen's first novel, tells the story of Helga Crane who is the lovely and refined daughter of a Danish mother and a West Indian black father who abandons Helga and her mother soon after Helga is born. Unable to feel comfortable with any of her white-skinned relatives, Helga travels America, visits Denmark searching for people she feels at home with. In Passing Clare and Irene are childhood friends who lose touch when Clare's father dies and she moves in with two white aunts. By hiding that Clare was part-black, they allowed her to 'pass' as a white woman and marry a white racist. Irene lives in Harlem, commits herself to racial uplift, and marries a black doctor. Passing centers on the meeting of these childhood friends later in life, and the unfolding of events as each woman is fascinated and seduced by the other's daring lifestyle. Freedom, The Wrong Man, and Sanctuary are three stories about love, loss, mistaken identity, and death. Nellallitea 'Nella' Larsen was an American novelist of the Harlem Renaissance. Though her literary output was scant, what she wrote earned her recognition by her contemporaries and by present-day critics. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Black Deutschland Darryl Pinckney, 2016-02-02 An intoxicating, provocative novel of appetite, identity, and self-construction, Darryl Pinckney's Black Deutschland tells the story of an outsider, trapped between a painful past and a tenebrous future, in Europe's brightest and darkest city. Jed—young, gay, black, out of rehab and out of prospects in his hometown of Chicago—flees to the city of his fantasies, a museum of modernism and decadence: Berlin. The paradise that tyranny created, the subsidized city isolated behind the Berlin Wall, is where he's chosen to become the figure that he so admires, the black American expatriate. Newly sober and nostalgic for the Weimar days of Isherwood and Auden, Jed arrives to chase boys and to escape from what it means to be a black male in America. But history, both personal and political, can't be avoided with time or distance. Whether it's the judgment of the cousin he grew up with and her husband's bourgeois German family, the lure of white wine in a down-and-out bar, a gang of racists looking for a brawl, or the ravaged visage of Rock Hudson flashing behind the face of every white boy he desperately longs for, the past never stays past even in faraway Berlin. In the age of Reagan and AIDS in a city on the verge of tearing down its walls, he clambers toward some semblance of adulthood amid the outcasts and expats, intellectuals and artists, queers and misfits. And, on occasion, the city keeps its Isherwood promises and the boy he kisses, incredibly, kisses him back. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: In Search of Nella Larsen George Hutchinson, 2006-05-30 Born to a Danish seamstress and a black West Indian cook in one of the Western Hemisphere's most infamous vice districts, Nella Larsen (1891-1964) lived her life in the shadows of America's racial divide. She wrote about that life, was briefly celebrated in her time, then was lost to later generations--only to be rediscovered and hailed by many as the best black novelist of her generation. In his search for Nella Larsen, the mystery woman of the Harlem Renaissance, George Hutchinson exposes the truths and half-truths surrounding this central figure of modern literary studies, as well as the complex reality they mask and mirror. His book is a cultural biography of the color line as it was lived by one person who truly embodied all of its ambiguities and complexities. Author of a landmark study of the Harlem Renaissance, Hutchinson here produces the definitive account of a life long obscured by misinterpretations, fabrications, and omissions. He brings Larsen to life as an often tormented modernist, from the trauma of her childhood to her emergence as a star of the Harlem Renaissance. Showing the links between her experiences and her writings, Hutchinson illuminates the singularity of her achievement and shatters previous notions of her position in the modernist landscape. Revealing the suppressions and misunderstandings that accompany the effort to separate black from white, his book addresses the vast consequences for all Americans of color-line culture's fundamental rule: race trumps family. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Caucasia Danzy Senna, 1999-02-01 From the author of New People and Colored Television, the extraordinary national bestseller that launched Danzy Senna’s literary career “Superbly illustrates the emotional toll that politics and race take … Haunting.” —The New York Times Book Review Birdie and Cole are the daughters of a black father and a white mother, intellectuals and activists in the Civil Rights Movement in 1970s Boston. The sisters are so close that they speak their own language, yet Birdie, with her light skin and straight hair, is often mistaken for white, while Cole is dark enough to fit in with the other kids at school. Despite their differences, Cole is Birdie’s confidant, her protector, the mirror by which she understands herself. Then their parents’ marriage collapses. One night Birdie watches her father and his new girlfriend drive away with Cole. Soon Birdie and her mother are on the road as well, drifting across the country in search of a new home. But for Birdie, home will always be Cole. Haunted by the loss of her sister, she sets out a desperate search for the family that left her behind. A modern classic, Caucasia is at once a powerful coming of age story and a groundbreaking work on identity and race in America. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Best of Simple Langston Hughes, 2015-10-13 Langston Hughes's stories about Jesse B. Semple--first composed for a weekly column in the Chicago Defender and then collected in Simple Speaks His Mind, Simple Takes a Wife, and Simple Stakes a Claim--have been read and loved by hundreds of thousands of readers. In The Best of Simple, the author picked his favorites from these earlier volumes, stories that not only have proved popular but are now part of a great and growing literary tradition. Simple might be considered an Everyman for black Americans. Hughes himself wrote: ...these tales are about a great many people--although they are stories about no specific persons as such. But it is impossible to live in Harlem and not know at least a hundred Simples, fifty Joyces, twenty-five Zaritas, and several Cousin Minnies--or reasonable facsimiles thereof. As Arnold Rampersad has written, Simple is one of the most memorable and winning characters in the annals of American literature, justly regarded as one of Hughes's most inspired creations. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Blackballed Darryl Pinckney, 2014-09-30 Blackballed is Darryl Pinckney’s meditation on a century and a half of participation by blacks in US electoral politics. In this combination of memoir, historical narrative, and contemporary political and social analysis, he investigates the struggle for black voting rights from Reconstruction through the civil rights movement to Barack Obama’s two presidential campaigns. Drawing on the work of scholars, the memoirs of civil rights workers, and the speeches and writings of black leaders like Martin Luther King and Stokely Carmichael, Andrew Young and John Lewis, Pinckney traces the disagreements among blacks about the best strategies for achieving equality in American society as well as the ways in which they gradually came to create the Democratic voting bloc that contributed to the election of the first black president. Interspersed through the narrative are Pinckney’s own memories of growing up during the civil rights era and the reactions of his parents to the changes taking place in American society. He concludes with an examination of ongoing efforts by Republicans to suppress the black vote, with particular attention to the Supreme Court’s recent decision striking down part of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Also included here is Pinckney’s essay “What Black Means Now,” on the history of the black middle class, stereotypes about blacks and crime, and contemporary debates about “post-blackness.” |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Plum Bun (Classic Reprint) Jessie Redmon Fauset, 2016-09-16 Excerpt from Plum Bun Angela had no high purpose in life; unlike her sister Virginia, who meant some day to invent a marvellous method for teaching the pianoforte, Angela felt no impulse to discover, or to perfect. True she thought she might become eventually a distinguished painter, but that was because she felt within herself an ability to depict which as far as it went was correct and promising. Her eye for line and for expression was already good and she had a nice feeling for colour. Moreover she possessed the instinct for self-appraisal which taught her that she had much to learn. And she was sure that the knowledge once gained would ower in her case to perfection. But her gift was not for her the end of existence; rather it was an adjunct to a life which was to know light, pleasure, gaiety and freedom. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: We the Animals Justin Torres, 2011 A debut novel that is a brilliant exploration of a close, complicated family and the struggle between brotherhood and becoming an individual |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Neither Black Nor White Yet Both Werner Sollors, 1999 Why can a white woman give birth to a black baby, while a black woman can never give birth to a white baby in the United States? What makes racial passing so different from social mobility? Why are interracial and incestuous relations often confused or conflated in literature, making miscegenation appear as if it were incest? Werner Sollors examines these questions and others in Neither Black nor White yet Both, a fully researched investigation of literary works that, in the past, have been read more for a black-white contrast of either-or than for an interracial realm of neither, nor, both, and in-between. From the origins of the term race to the cultural sources of the Tragic Mulatto, and from the calculus of color to the retellings of various plots, Sollors examines what we know about race, analyzing recurrent motifs in scientific and legal works as well as in fiction, drama, and poetry. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Vanishing Half Brit Bennett, 2022-02-01 #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2020 BY THE NEW YORK TIMES • THE WASHINGTON POST • NPR • PEOPLE • TIME MAGAZINE • VANITY FAIR • GLAMOUR New York Times Readers Pick: 100 Best Books of the 21st Century 2021 WOMEN'S PRIZE FINALIST “Bennett’s tone and style recalls James Baldwin and Jacqueline Woodson, but it’s especially reminiscent of Toni Morrison’s 1970 debut novel, The Bluest Eye.” —Kiley Reid, Wall Street Journal “A story of absolute, universal timelessness . . . For any era, it's an accomplished, affecting novel. For this moment, it’s piercing, subtly wending its way toward questions about who we are and who we want to be….” – Entertainment Weekly From The New York Times-bestselling author of The Mothers, a stunning new novel about twin sisters, inseparable as children, who ultimately choose to live in two very different worlds, one black and one white. The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it's not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it's everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Many years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other secretly passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters' storylines intersect? Weaving together multiple strands and generations of this family, from the Deep South to California, from the 1950s to the 1990s, Brit Bennett produces a story that is at once a riveting, emotional family story and a brilliant exploration of the American history of passing. Looking well beyond issues of race, The Vanishing Half considers the lasting influence of the past as it shapes a person's decisions, desires, and expectations, and explores some of the multiple reasons and realms in which people sometimes feel pulled to live as something other than their origins. As with her New York Times-bestselling debut The Mothers, Brit Bennett offers an engrossing page-turner about family and relationships that is immersive and provocative, compassionate and wise. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Carmilla Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Garies and Their Friends Frank J. Webb, 1857 Originally published in London in 1857 and never before available in paperback, The Garies and Their Friends is the second novel published by an African American and the first to chronicle the experience of free blacks in the pre-Civil War northeast. The novel anticipates themes that were to become important in later African American fiction, including miscegenation and 'passing, ' and tells the story of the Garies and their friends, the Ellises, a 'highly respectable and industrious coloured family.' |
| passing by nella larsen full text: White Like Her Gail Lukasik, 2017-10-17 White Like Her: My Family’s Story of Race and Racial Passing is the story of Gail Lukasik’s mother’s “passing,” Gail’s struggle with the shame of her mother’s choice, and her subsequent journey of self-discovery and redemption. In the historical context of the Jim Crow South, Gail explores her mother’s decision to pass, how she hid her secret even from her own husband, and the price she paid for choosing whiteness. Haunted by her mother’s fear and shame, Gail embarks on a quest to uncover her mother’s racial lineage, tracing her family back to eighteenth-century colonial Louisiana. In coming to terms with her decision to publicly out her mother, Gail changed how she looks at race and heritage. With a foreword written by Kenyatta Berry, host of PBS's Genealogy Roadshow, this unique and fascinating story of coming to terms with oneself breaks down barriers. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Europe in Sepia Dubravka Ugrešić, 2014 Ugresic, ever the flaneur, wanders from the Midwest to Zuccotti Park, the Irish Aran Islands to Jerusalem's Mea Shearim, from the tristesse of Dutch housing estates to the riots of South London, charting everything from the listlessness of Central Europe to the ennui of the Low Countries. One finger on the pulse of an exhausted Europe, another in the wounds of post-industrial America, Ugresic trawls the fallout of political failure and the detritus of popular culture, mining each for revelation. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Edge of Heaven Marita Golden, 1998 A black family disintegrates after the mother, an accountant, begins outshining her husband, an artist. The fights become more frequent, the couple split and the wife hits the bottle. More fights follow, these with her daughters, one of whom is accidentally killed, and the mother goes to jail. The story is told in part by the surviving daughter, a law student. By the author of Do Remember Me. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: The Harlem Renaissance Steven Watson, 1995 Now in paperback, this first volume in the highly acclaimed series devoted to the ofounders and founding ideas of Modernism chronicles the lives of an interactions among the men and women who formed one of the most dynamic cultural movements in 20th-century history. Indispensable to students of the Harlem Renaissance and the Jazz Age.--Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Photos & drawings. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Erasure Percival Everett, 2011-10-25 Thelonius Monk Ellison is an erudite, accomplished but seldom-read author who insists on writing obscure literary papers rather than the so-called ghetto prose that would make him a commercial success. He finally succumbs to temptation after seeing the Oberlin-educated author of We's Lives in da Ghetto during her appearance on a talk show, firing back with a parody called My Pafology, which he submits to his startled agent under the gangsta pseudonym of Stagg R. Leigh. Ellison quickly finds himself with a six-figure advance from a major house, a multimillion-dollar offer for the movie rights and a monster bestseller on his hands. The money helps with a family crisis, allowing Ellison to care for his widowed mother as she drifts into the fog of Alzheimer's, but it doesn't ease the pain after his sister, a physician, is shot by right-wing fanatics for performing abortions. The dark side of wealth surfaces when both the movie mogul and talk-show host demand to meet the nonexistent Leigh, forcing Ellison to don a disguise and invent a sullen, enigmatic character to meet the demands of the market. The final indignity occurs when Ellison becomes a judge for a major book award and My Pafology (title changed to Fuck) gets nominated, forcing the author to come to terms with his perverse literary joke.--Publisher's description. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Mislaid Nell Zink, 2015-07-23 ‘Nell Zink is a writer of extraordinary talent and range. Her work insistently raises the possibility that the world is larger and stranger than the world you think you know.’ Jonathan Franzen |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Two on a Tower Annotated Thomas Hardy, 2021-01-26 Two on a Tower, a tale of star crossed love, is considered a minor work of Thomas Hardy. When it was published, it was called 'shocking' and 'repulsive'. So, make of that what you will. But this was Victorian England, and the book tells the tale of an aristocratic woman falling in love with a 'commoner' who is 8 years younger than her. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Illuminating Letters Paul C. Gutjahr, Megan L. Benton, 2001 What do we read when we read a text? The author's words, of course, but is that all? The prevailing publishing ethic has insisted that typography?the selection and arrangement of type and other visual elements on a page?should be an invisible, silent, and deferential servant to the text it conveys. This book contests that conventional point of view. Looking at texts ranging from the King James Bible to contemporary comic strips, the contributors to Illuminating Letters examine the seldom considered but richly revealing relationships between a text's typography and its literary interpretation. The essays assume no previous typographic knowledge or expertise; instead they invite readers primarily concerned with literary and cultural meanings to turn a more curious eye to the visual and physical forms of a specific text or genre. As the contributors show, closer inspection of those forms can yield fresh insights into the significance of a text's material presentation, leading readers to appreciate better how presentation shapes understandings of the text's meanings and values. The case studies included in the volume amplify its two overarching themes: one set explores the roles of printers and publishers in manipulating, willingly or not, the meaning and reception of texts through typographic choices; the other group examines the efforts of authors to circumvent or subvert such mediation by directly controlling the typographic presentation of their texts. Together these essays demonstrate that choices about type selection and arrangement do indeed help to orchestrate textual meaning. In addition to the editors, contributors include Sarah A. Kelen, Beth McCoy, Steven R. Price, Leon Jackson, and Gene Kannenberg Jr. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Harlem Renaissance Novels Rafia Zafar, 2011 Presents classic novels from the 1920s and 1930s that offer insight into the cultural dynamics of the Harlem Renaissance era and celebrate the period's diverse literary styles. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Modern American Literature Catherine Morley, 2012-05-11 An incisive study of modern American literature, casting new light on its origins and themes. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: They Aren't, Until I Call Them Enikő Bollobás, 2010 The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is available in the internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: What We See in the Smoke Ben Berman Ghan, 2019-05-30 The world we know is coming to an end. How will we connect in the strange and frightening one that's coming to take its place? What We See in the Smoke twists the genres of realism and science fiction to tell the future history of Toronto, a story that stretches from this millennium to the next. Ben Berman Ghan spins a web of these lives and many more, blending the familiar with the surreal until both give way to the story of ordinary people in extraordinary times. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Nella Larsen, Novelist of the Harlem Renaissance Thadious M. Davis, 1994 Examines the life of the enigmatic figure of the Harlem Renaissance, including details of her secretive personal life and the influence of her works on modern readers. |
| passing by nella larsen full text: Communal Modernisms E. Hinnov, L. Rosenblum, L. Harris, 2013-05-07 Drawing from recent research that seeks to expand our understanding of modernism, this volume offers practical pedagogical approaches for teaching modernist literature and culture in the twenty-first century classroom. |
PASSING | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
PASSING definition: 1. in sport, the act of kicking, throwing, or hitting the ball to someone in your own team: 2. the…. Learn more.
Passing (film) - Wikipedia
Passing is a 2021 historical drama film written and directed by Rebecca Hall in her feature directorial debut. Adapted from the 1929 novel of the same name by Nella Larsen, set in …
PASSING Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of PASSING is the act of one that passes or causes to pass; especially : death. How to use passing in a sentence.
PASSING definition in American English - Collins Online Dictionary
A passing mention or reference is brief and is made while you are talking or writing about something else.
Passing - definition of passing by The Free Dictionary
Define passing. passing synonyms, passing pronunciation, passing translation, English dictionary definition of passing. adj. 1. Moving by; going past: The child waved to the passing cars. 2. Of …
Passing - перевод, транскрипция, произношение, примеры
Перевод Passing - прохождение, протекание, проходящий, мимолетный, чрезвычайно, очень. Транскрипция - |ˈpæsɪŋ|. Примеры - in passing, passing rich, passing fancy, passing …
What does Passing mean? - Definitions.net
Passing is the ability of a person to be regarded as a member of social groups other than his or her own, such as a different race, ethnicity, social class, gender, intelligence, age and/or …
Passing Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary
PASSING meaning: 1 : the act of moving toward and beyond something usually + of; 2 : used to talk about the movement of time usually + of
PASSING Definition & Meaning - Dictionary.com
Employees with a passing racial identity expressed frequent discomfort in the workplace. Sometimes Offensive. being known or perceived as a gender other than the one assigned at …
Passing - Definition, Meaning & Synonyms | Vocabulary.com
If you give someone a passing glance, you look so briefly in their direction that you barely see them. Passing is one of those versatile words with many different uses. A passing reference is …
PASSING | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
PASSING definition: 1. in sport, the act of kicking, throwing, or hitting the ball to someone in your own team: 2. the…. Learn more.
Passing (film) - Wikipedia
Passing is a 2021 historical drama film written and directed by Rebecca Hall in her feature directorial debut. Adapted from the 1929 novel of the same name by Nella Larsen, set in 1920s …
PASSING Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of PASSING is the act of one that passes or causes to pass; especially : death. How to use passing in a sentence.
PASSING definition in American English - Collins Online Dictionary
A passing mention or reference is brief and is made while you are talking or writing about something else.
Passing - definition of passing by The Free Dictionary
Define passing. passing synonyms, passing pronunciation, passing translation, English dictionary definition of passing. adj. 1. Moving by; going past: The child waved to the passing cars. 2. Of …
Passing - перевод, транскрипция, произношение, примеры
Перевод Passing - прохождение, протекание, проходящий, мимолетный, чрезвычайно, очень. Транскрипция - |ˈpæsɪŋ|. Примеры - in passing, passing rich, passing fancy, passing …
What does Passing mean? - Definitions.net
Passing is the ability of a person to be regarded as a member of social groups other than his or her own, such as a different race, ethnicity, social class, gender, intelligence, age and/or …
Passing Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary
PASSING meaning: 1 : the act of moving toward and beyond something usually + of; 2 : used to talk about the movement of time usually + of
PASSING Definition & Meaning - Dictionary.com
Employees with a passing racial identity expressed frequent discomfort in the workplace. Sometimes Offensive. being known or perceived as a gender other than the one assigned at …
Passing - Definition, Meaning & Synonyms | Vocabulary.com
If you give someone a passing glance, you look so briefly in their direction that you barely see them. Passing is one of those versatile words with many different uses. A passing reference is …
