Passing by Nella Larsen

First published: 1929

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Social realism

Time of plot: Early twentieth century

Locale: New York

Principal characters

• Irene Redfield, a black socialite
• Clare Kendry, a black socialite who is passing as white
• Gertrude Martin, a black socialite who is passing as white
• Brian Redfield, Irene’s husband
• John “Jack” Bellew, Clare’s husband

The Story:

Irene Redfield receives a letter from Clare Kendry that she considers dangerous, since she knows that Clare has been passing for white and that Clare’s association with any black person is dangerous. Irene recalls that Clare has always been different, sneaky, and clever, as well as independent, selfish, and self-centered; she remembers Clare’s poise as a teenager when her drunken father bellowed at her for disobeying him. When Clare’s father was killed in a saloon fight, Clare was angry with him for abandoning her.

Irene reads the letter from Clare, who is in New York and wants to see her. Irene is determined not to see Clare, recalling the last time she had accidentally run into Clare. It is two summers earlier, and Irene is in Chicago, shopping for her sons, Brian, Jr., and Theodore. Feeling very warm and thirsty, she stops at the Drayton Hotel for tea. She notices a woman staring at her and thinks she is doing so because she is black. The woman approaches Irene and claims to know her, but Irene does not remember her, until she laughs; she then recognizes the laugh as belonging to Clare Kendry. There had been rumors about Clare’s sudden disappearance from the black community twelve years earlier. Irene and Clare talk about what they had been doing over the years. Irene invites Clare to her house but immediately regrets it. Irene questions Clare about passing for white but Clare, noting that they were both drinking tea at the all-white Drayton Hotel, turns the question back. Irene gets angry and leaves, vowing to have nothing more to do with Clare.

A few days later, Clare repeatedly calls the Redfield residence, but Irene refuses to speak with her, letting her maid, Liza, answer the phone. Finally, exasperated by the constant ringing of the phone, she answers the phone and lets Clare badger her into visiting her. At Clare’s home, Irene and another woman, Gertrude Martin, exchange cool greetings. Irene does not like Gertrude who, like Clare, is passing for white and is married to a white man. Irene’s opinion of Gertrude does not improve when Gertrude tells her and Clare that she does not want to have any “dark” children. Irene’s temper flares and she reminds Gertrude that her children—Brian, Jr., and Theodore—are “dark.” At that moment, John “Jack” Bellew, Clare’s husband, walks in and greets Clare with the nickname Nig. Amid tense silence, when Clare tells John to explain why he calls her that, John says that when he met Clare she was “white as a lily,” but that she appeared to be getting darker. Nig was his affectionate way of telling her that one morning she would wake up a “nigger.” Prompted by an angry but subdued Irene, John goes on to say that he hates black people. Suppressing both laughter and anger, Irene leaves, followed by Gertrude.

Just before she returns to New York, Irene receives a note from Clare, begging for understanding and forgiveness. Irene tears up the note and turns her thoughts to the situation at home. Her main concern is whether Brian, her husband, is still discontent and restless.

All this had occurred two years earlier in Chicago, and until that morning, Irene had not heard from Clare. Irene is suspicious of Clare’s alleged love for her own people. She brings up the subject of Clare with Brian at breakfast. Brian expresses admiration of Clare’s sense of adventure and talks of his desire to go to Brazil. Irene becomes angry, telling him that he had made the right decision when he set up his race philanthropy charities in New York. They part angrily from each other, and Irene feels uneasy about the security of her marriage.

Still upset over her fight with Brian, Irene tears up the letter from Clare and determines not to contact her. Days go by and Irene forgets about Clare. Instead, she continues to worry about Brian’s restlessness and unhappiness. Several days later, Irene is shocked to answer her doorbell and find Clare standing there. To her own surprise, Irene is happy to see Clare, yet she warns Clare that it is not safe for them to be friends, given John Bellew’s beliefs about blacks. Clare finds Irene’s concern humorous and tells her that she wants to be invited to the Negro Welfare Dance that Brian organized. Irene gives in despite her own premonitions of disaster, but once Clare leaves she becomes angry with herself for giving in to Clare. Irene then gets angry with Clare, realizing that she is as selfish as she had always been.

Clare becomes a regular visitor to the Redfield household. Irene begins to notice how well Brian and Clare get along and gradually begins to suspect that Clare has designs on her husband. When Clare admits to Irene that she is bad and not to be trusted, Irene’s suspicions flare into terror, especially since Brian seems even more distant and withdrawn. Irene begins to consider how she can rid herself of Clare, and she begins to wish horrible afflictions on Clare’s family. Meeting John on the street, she tells him she is black and is pleased to see his distress and hatred. For a moment, she considers destroying Clare, too, by revealing her race, but she cannot go through with it. As a black woman she feels loyalty to Clare even if only because of their gender and race.

Just before leaving for a party, Irene and Brian argue over how to raise their sons. Afterward, Irene admits to herself that the only thing she wants from Brian is security. She is shocked to realize that she has never loved Brian and never will. Yet she is determined to keep him, no matter what the cost. They go to the party with Clare. Shortly after they arrive, John rushes in after knocking loudly at the door, and he is demanding his wife. When he calls her a nigger, Clare begins to laugh. He seizes her arm, and Irene tries to stop—or help—him. In the next instant, Clare falls or jumps—or is pushed—out of the open window. Everyone except Irene rushes downstairs to the sidewalk. Irene is in shock, but she also is relieved that Clare is dead. A police officer comes upstairs and asks Irene if she is sure Clare had jumped. Brian had told the officer that John had pushed Clare, but Irene refutes her husband. The officer decides that Clare’s death was probably an accident.

Bibliography

Calloway, Licia Morrow. “Elite Rejection of Maternity in Nella Larsen’s Quicksand and Passing.” In Black Family (Dys)function in Novels by Jessie Fauset, Nella Larsen, and Fannie Hurst. New York: Peter Lang, 2003. Calloway’s analysis of Passing focuses on Larsen’s depiction of maternity and her handling of the class pressures upon upward-aspiring African Americans.

Carby, Hazel V. Reconstructing Womanhood: The Emergence of the Afro-American Woman Novelist. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. In this study of the rise of black women novelists, Carby considers Larsen to be one of the most important novelists, female or male, to emerge from the Harlem Renaissance. Focuses on Larsen’s aesthetics and her political and social critiques.

Davis, Arthur P. From the Dark Tower: Afro-American Writers, 1900 to 1960. Washington, D.C.: Howard University Press, 1982. Takes a historical perspective, focusing on Larsen’s fiction and its place in the larger aesthetic ambience of black American writing of the twentieth century.

Davis, Thadious M. “Nella Larsen’s Harlem Aesthetic.” In The Harlem Renaissance: Revaluations, edited by Amritjit Singh, William S. Shiver, and Stanley Brodwin. New York: Garland, 1989. Argues that Larsen’s aesthetic faithfully captures the spirit of her times. Emphasizes the tension Larsen evokes between the social and the personal. Part of the Critical Studies on Black Life and Culture series.

Hutchinson, George. In Search of Nella Larsen: A Biography of the Color Line. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 2006. Examines Larsen’s work, life, and place in social history, describing how she deals with personal issues of racial identity and fear of abandonment in her novels. Chapter 16 explores Passing.

Kramer, Victor A., ed. The Harlem Renaissance Re-Examined. New York: AMS Press, 1987. Especially important in this collection of contemporary background essays updating the critical views of Larsen and her literary associates is Lillie P. Howard’s study of Larsen’s use of the themes of crossing and of materialism.

Larsen, Nella. Passing: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism. Edited by Carla Kaplan. W. W. Norton, 2007. This edition of Passing includes a detailed introduction by Kaplan. The “Background and Contexts” section ties the novel to the historical events of the time the novel was written. Reprints fourteen contemporary reviews, including one by W. E. B. Du Bois, and includes discussions of race and passing by Larsen and Langston Hughes. The “Criticism” section contains fifteen interpretations of the novel.

McLendon, Jacquelyn Y. The Politics of Color in the Fiction of Jessie Fauset and Nella Larsen. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1995. A study of the theme of the “tragic mulatto” in the novels of Larsen and Jessie Redmon Fauset. Devotes a chapter to an analysis of Passing.

Ransom, Portia Boulware. Black Love and the Harlem Renaissance (The Novels of Nella Larsen, Jessie Redmon Fauset, and Zora Neale Hurston): An Essay in African American Literary Criticism. Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Press, 2005. Examines how Larsen, Jessie Fauset, and Zora Neale Hurston use their semibiographical fiction to focus on the tensions between black men and women who are trying to define themselves.

Wald, Gayle. Crossing the Line: Racial Passing in Twentieth-Century U.S. Literature and Culture. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2000. Examines the “passing narratives” of African American writers such as Larsen, James Weldon Johnson, and Jessie Redmon Fauset. Argues the literature uses the “passing plot” in an attempt to negotiate identity, agency, and freedom.