Analysis Of Quicksand By Nella Larsen

The book goes through Jeannette’s life exposing the mistakes she, her siblings, and her parents made to become the family they were. As her life grows older, Jeannette finds herself in more responsible positions in the world, with editing school newspapers, to writing columns in a small New York newspaper outlet. Her troubles have raised the issue of stereotyping, a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing. Due to her status in her childhood, it was not hard for her to fit in with the other members of the poor community. “Dinitia explained that I was with her and that I was good people. The women looked at one another and shrugged.” (Walls 191) The quote talks about how members of the black community in Welch accepted Jeannette to go swimming with them in the morning hours before the white people went in the afternoon. The people who knew Dinita, Jeannette’s friend, knew that Dinita was trustworthy, and let Jeannette pass. This relates to the thesis because it shows how she was accepted amongst the people who were

of a girl who was misunderstood. Throughout her childhood and young adulthood, Daphne struggled with identifying with her feelings. Daphne was constantly searching for an answer to why she felt different. Daphne wanted to “fit in” but she knew she was unconventional. The different labels she was given through out her psychiatric stay stuck with her and left a scar of how she was once perceived.

The plot, or basic storyline, of this short story is about a black woman, Annie Johnson, based in the United States before 1905. Her marriage had collapsed due to her husband leaving her to pursue religion in Oklahoma and leaving her with very little money. The plotline develops on to show her struggle to support herself and her two sons and how she has to use courage to support herself and her family.

Throughout American Literature, women have been depicted in many different ways. The portrayal of women in American Literature is often influenced by an author's personal experience or a frequent societal stereotype of women and their position. Often times, male authors interpret society’s views of women in a completely different nature than a female author would. While F. Scott Fitzgerald may represent his main female character as a victim in the 1920’s, Zora Neale Hurston portrays hers as a strong, free-spirited, and independent woman only a decade later in the 1930’s.

Helga discovers the extent of the “freedom” about which she had previously remarked when she finds herself void of any family in America: Peter's wife tells Helga, “Please remember that my husband is not your uncle,” (1545) which emotionally injures Helga. Furthermore, she endures weeks of vocational freedom (1548), making the first job offered to her a necessity. When the issue of family again presents itself, Helga explains to Mrs. Hayes-Rore, “I haven't any people. There's only me, so I can do as I please” (1551); the latter is not entirely true, as Helga, “hysterical” and “afraid to hope,” (1548) accepts Mrs. Hayes-Rore's commission since she has no other choice (despite her freedom). While she has resolved to live in New York (1549), Helga only travels and finds lodging there through her passivity.

According to Elizabeth Lowell, “Some of us aren't meant to belong. Some of us have to turn the world upside down and shake the hell out of it until we make our own place in it.” Sometimes what every situation needs is an outsider to flip the script and create a new outlook on everything. In Shirley Jackson’s novel, “We Have Always Lived in the Castle,” the speaker, Merricat, is an outsider of society on many levels, such as mental health, gender, and that she is an upper class citizen in a poor area. Although Merricat is mentally unstable, her outsider’s perspective criticizes the social standard for women in the 1960s, indicating that social roles, marriage, and the patriarchy are not necessary aspects in life such as it is not necessary to have the same outlook on life as others.

Nella Larsen’s Quicksand illustrates the main protagonist’s struggles with her identity, especially in regards to race and gender expectations. Helga is always put in a position to conform to what society expects of her, and the fact that she comes from a biracial background further stratifies her identity/status as an individual. In the novel Quicksand, Helga’s interactions with certain male characters and her life events highlight the inescapable social structure that oppresses women, especially those of color.

Throughout Kidd’s exquisitely written story, Handful struggles, sometimes with quiet dissidence, sometimes with open rebellion, to cultivate a belief in the invincibility of her spirit and in the sacred truth that one does not need actual wings in order to rise. Barely a stone’s throw from the slave quarters where Handful and her mother share a room behind the grand Grimké house, another young woman fights a different battle with the constraints of her society. Sarah Grimké is the middle daughter of a wealthy and prominent family at the pinnacle of Charleston’s social hierarchy, the daughter her mother calls difficult and her father calls remarkable. From the time of her first violent childhood confrontation with slavery, Sarah is unable to abide the oppression and brutality of the slave system that surrounds her. Ambitious and keenly intelligent, she harbors an intense longing to have a voice in the world and to follow her father and brothers’ footsteps to a profession in the law. Crushed by the strictures that her family and society impose on women, Sarah forges a tortuous, yet brave path toward

The entertainment of a Harlem cabaret hypnotizes Helga Crane, the protagonist of Nella Larsen's Quicksand. She loses herself in the "sudden streaming rhythm" and delights in the sexually suggestive moves of the dancers. Helga is "blown out, ripped out, beaten out by the joyous, wild, murky orchestra" in a moment suggestive of a sexual climax. But when the music fades, Helga returns to reality and asserts that "she wasn't, she told herself, a jungle creature." Helga feels this struggle between sexual freedom and restraint throughout the novel. As Larsen shows in the cabaret, black women of the early twentieth century repressed their sexual desires so that white America would perceive them as respectable. In its fight for equality, the black social elite wanted women to emulate the conventions of mainstream society. Maintaining a good image was intended not only to produce change within the race, but also to combat white stereotypes that caused discrimination against black people. Thus, described as primitive and promiscuous since slavery, black women hid their sexuality under socially accepted behavior. But, as Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham refers to it, this "politics of respectability" had profound consequences.

As conformity becomes ever more common within a society, individuals isolate themselves, but only because the conformists have lost their ability to reflect on their decisions. Similarly, while Bernard and Lenina watch the sea in peace, he makes comments about individuality and its benefits, which startles Lenina, who exclaims, “And how can you talk like that about not wanting to be a part of the social body? After all, every one works for everyone else” (Huxley 91). Here, Lenina is absolutely shocked that Bernard would not want to be with everyone else. However, the sole reason why people only want to conform is that they cannot begin to express their own thoughts and feelings. A person’s individuality is what sets them apart from the rest of society, and when taken away, they become generic. Even though conforming can cause a lot of problems in a person, they are able to agree with a group of people and are able to convey ideas clearly as well as not feel left out. Furthermore, in the story The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas by Ursula Le Guin, there are many examples of conformity when it comes to witnessing the child that is responsible for the “happiness” in

Harriet Wilson’s novel Our Nig, follows the life of Frado, a young mulatto girl in the household of a white family in New England. She is abandoned to this family at the age of six because her mother could not afford to care for her and resented her and the hardships to which her birth had contributed. The mistress of the household to which Frado is left is a cruel and spiteful woman, especially towards blacks. When Frado is left in the care of the Bellmont residence as a young girl, she has no idea of the troubles she would have to face for most of her life. From the very beginning, neither Mrs. Bellmont, the main antagonist, nor her equally cruel daughter, Mary, show any hint of compassion or even mercy for the young girl. The story follows Frado and her life in the Bellmont household.

The National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and Pulitzer Prize nominee novel Black Water by Joyce Carol Oates takes one on an intense and thrilling journey through Kelly Kelleher’s eyes. Her typical laidback life turns upside down and she finds herself in a life and death situation after she makes the simple mistake of leaving a party with a stranger. Why would she do that? What in the world convinced her to leave with that man? The answer can be found in her past. There are numerous factors in her past that negatively affected her as a whole, but the worst one of all is the abusive relationship she was in. This man tore down her self-esteem and molded her into some sort of object he could access anytime anywhere. This inferior relationship overall contributes to the main idea of the novel, which is that knowing your self-worth and sticking up for yourself might save you from being left for dead in a black rented Toyota at the bottom of a marsh.

Angelina Weld Grimké’s, Rachel, portrays an African American family’s experience and development over the course of several years during the segregation era. Act one begins in a domestic setting, introducing the main character, Rachel Loving. Rachel is eighteen, living with her mother, Mrs. Loving, and brother, Tom. Notably, the Loving household is presented as a cheerful and affectionate place, full of laughter and lightheartedness. In a like manner, Rachel emerges as warm and cheerful, yet overall naive; never once questioning the absence of her father and brother, who passed ten years earlier. Initially, Rachel is lively and passionate, bearing a deep infatuation for motherhood and constantly proclaiming her dream to raise a child. Nevertheless,

At this point, some critics would argue that the idea of Helga being both facets of each component of what constitutes a modernist piece of literature is preposterous. Of course that would make sense if only concrete concepts were being discussed here. When abstract concepts of what constitutes a fluid or evolving person are on the table, then everything is not cut and dry. Although Helga may be more continuous than discontinuous, that is not meant to say that she could not possibly be discontinuous at all. Rather, it takes a different mindset to see how each side of the coin is feasible. Nothing is set is stone that a character must only be one way to be classified a certain way. Being able to understand the two sides helps further more understanding

An example of this notion is shown in Hope Leslie when Governor Winthrop, the landlord, reacts to Hope, the tenant, coming home late and refuses to reveal her reason why: “...Winthrop was not accustomed to have his inquisitorial rights resisted by those in his own household, and he was more struck than pleased by Hope’s moral courage” (184). Evidently, Winthrop’s reaction proves that women with “moral courage” are unladylike because moral courage is a manly trait. On the other hand, Esther Downing, another character in Hope Leslie, embodies the cult of true womanhood. Esther’s mere look at her love interest Everell is described as “a look of...pleased dependence, which is natural... and which men like to inspire, because --perhaps -- it seems to them an instinctive tribute to their natural superiority” (219). So, “Esther’s look … of dependence” confirms that the expectation that all women are supposed to have the same behavior, gestures and personality is meant to not only please men but to also hide their true form. Therefore, the cult of true womanhood presents an internal battle in female writers and Sedgwick presents this womanly struggle through the contrast between Hope and Esther. Society wants women to be quaint housewives but publishing a book defies the cult of true womanhood. Thus, defying the qualities rooted in the cult of true womanhood causes high risk of