Determinism in Nella Larsen’s Quicksand During the Harlem Renaissance, many literary works concentrated on celebrating African American heritage. However, many other writers also began concentrating on the darker theme of naturalism. Nella Larsen’s Quicksand illustrates many elements of this movement. These include a biological determinism, where man is conceived of as controlled by his primitive animal instincts and a sociological determinism, whereby the weak are destroyed and the strong survive
Helga's Problem With Commitment in Nella Larsen's Quicksand In Nella Larsen's Quicksand, Helga Crane passively opts out of situations; her actions are consistently reactionary. Helga’s anxiety is the figurative “quicksand” in which she sinks throughout the novel: Helga is too afraid to commit to a decision and thus flees geographically, failing to realize she can not find happiness through avoiding decisions. Naxos is the first place Helga leaves to flee from commitments. Her engagement to
the thought of blank Thursdays. Discomfort held hands with the black of night, and the black of night greeted me with a sour embrace. The next morning, it was such a strenuous struggle to rise from my bed, I could have sworn I had been lying in quicksand all night. Walking in school was like swimming in a thick marsh. I had nothing to look forward to. Thursdays used to be the greatest day of the week, but now, all Thursdays held was gloom. That day, all I knew was despair, and it smothered me. This
across doing the first essay was retracing the past, retracing the sadness. Having to bring back sad memories that made my life terrible at the time. Doing the essay, I learned that I have gone through a lot of crap. I was sinking in quicksand and now I stand on the quicksand like it is rock solid. I am proud of myself. I was able to turn my life around and be the person that I am today. I might have the potential to be a good writer someday. People compliment on my writing skills every now and then when
illusion or the presented. • “..in 1882, James determined ‘to write a very “American tale, a tale very characteristics of our social conditions,” (pg. 1208) • An important theme in “The Quicksand” is that it is a bad thing to make a decision solely based on incomplete information. o The title could be a comparison of quicksand to the effects of making such decisions, because it could leave the person stuck in their thoughts of the moment. A message or theme of the story is that people like the illusion
The African American fight for freedom has been long and agonizing, but even more so for black women as Larsen demonstrates in her novel, Quicksand, with the character Helga Crane who fights in her own ways against both racism and social expectation. Larsen’s own distaste for the expectation of conformity in society combined with her unique perspective as an African American woman, which wasn’t often represented in literature, are some of the main concepts she uses to construct Helga Crane’s story
In the novella, Quicksand by Nella Larsen, the reader follows the story of a mulatto woman, Helga Crane, who longs for a place of true belonging and combats her internal discontent by moving to one place after the other. However, even among the black people in America, she
illness. Trying to desperately find where you fit in and feel at home can be exhausting and in some cases never ending. In Nella Larsen’s Quicksand, there is a constant theme of isolation and alienation, which subsequently affects every aspect of the main character, Helga Crane’s, life throughout the novella. When we first meet Helga in the beginning of Quicksand we right away get the sense that she is unhappy where she is in her life. Helga very quickly decides to leave her teaching job at Naxos to
The first encounter with Helga Crane, Nella Larsen’s protagonist in the novel Quicksand, introduces the heroine unwinding after a day of work in a dimly lit room. She is alone. And while no one else is present in the room, Helga is accompanied by her own thoughts, feelings, and her worrisome perceptions of the world around her. Throughout the novel, it becomes clear that most of Helga’s concerns revolve around two issues- race and sex. Even though there are many human character antagonists that play
The definition of home is: the place where one lives permanently. Home is a place where one feels accepted, loved, and comfortable enough to be themselves completely. In Nella Larsen’s “Quicksand”, main character Helga is a bi-racial woman in the 1920’s who struggles internally with where she feels she belongs and where she can call home. Throughout the entire novel Helga moves to many different places to try and feel at home. In the society that Helga is cursed to have to live in, biracial people
First Response Identity In this novel the author explore the struggles of African-American women to forge an identity for herself that is free of the bonds placed on her by society. The protagonist of Quicksand, create identities for herself that transcend racial boundaries. The daughter of Danish woman and black jazz musician she has never know, Helga has never had black family member. However she struggles with the disconnect between her appearance and external reality. She never feels at home
After the end of World WarⅠthe countries involved had to find a way to repair all the damage that was caused worldwide because of their fighting, so they came up with a treaty of 'peace', The Treaty of Versailles. The Treaty of Versailles was signed on Versailles, France in 1919 where the four representatives of the major countries on the Entente Powers (The Allies) - Woodrow Wilson President of the United States, The Prime Minister of Great Britain, Lloyd George, The Prime Minister of France, Georges
The first encounter with Helga Crane, Nella Larsen’s protagonist in the novel Quicksand, introduces the heroine unwinding after a day of work in a dimly lit room. Alone. Or, is she? Although no one else is present in the room, Helga is accompanied by her own thoughts, feelings, and her worrisome perceptions of the world around her. Helga’s anxieties and fears are perhaps some of her most challenging adversaries. And while there are human character antagonists that will soon play a significant role
experience of a specific African American, a man. For an African American woman the struggle she faces is even more complex, a triple consciousness. Here in she must make sense of being an American, a black person, and a woman. In Nella Larsen’s Quicksand the protagonist, Helga Crane, personifies triple consciousness and captures the struggle of a black woman in America. For instance, Nela Larsen begins her novel, before her main character Helga is introduced, with a quote from Langston Hughes,
The final text I have chosen is Quicksand by the American female author Nella Larsen. Just like Little Women, Quicksand could be seen to be a biographical account of Larsen’s life in the Harlem renaissance. The novel follows the life of a female protagonist called Helga Crane, who is a young mixed race woman, struggling to find a correct place within society. “The geography of the soul, the rocky, rich terrain of dreams, is in reality the setting for Quicksand and Passing. Helga Crane and Clare Kendry
excerpts The Autobiography of Ex-Colored Man and Quicksand and they both leave New York and one they reach their destination their curiosity run wild with the plan in The Autobiography of Ex-Colored Man setting ,events, and character developed curiosity by questioning their surrounding in both excerpts. Both Larsen and Johnson use their characters to develop the theme of curiosity. In the theme of curiosity. In the excerpt from Quicksand states “Just for a moment outside the dining
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath and Quicksand by Nella Larsen? Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know ============================== How does the author's treatment of relationships effect the characterisation of the heroines in "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath and "Quicksand" by Nella Larsen? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- This essay will compare the ways in which the novels "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath and "Quicksand" by Nella Larsen deal with relationships
glistening brocaded mules, deep sunk in the big high-backed chair, against whose dark tapestry her sharply cut face, with skin like yellow satin, was distinctly outlined, she was—to use a hackneyed word—attractive.” (Larsen 30) Throughout Nella Larsen’s Quicksand, Helga is portrayed as a woman of impeccable taste. Her luxurious possessions literally frame her in the opening paragraph of the novel. Helga, much like a skilled artist, is seen throughout her Great Migration to be creating a work of monumental
was also a movement that focused on issues specific to African American communities such as racism and cultural representation. This period also marked the rise of an American Dream defined by wealth accumulation and the ties to social status. “Quicksand,” by Nella Larsen, is about the life of Helga Crane, a biracial woman, and her struggles to find belonging within various communities. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “Winter Dreams” narrates Dexter Green’s pursuit of the American Dream within a stratified
The character of Helga Crane from the novel Quicksand by Nella Larsen is a very complex character, struggling with racial identity, social class and sexism. Helga Crane is a twenty-three year old schoolteacher that comes from a mixed racial background. Her birth mother was a Danish woman, while her birth father was of West African descent. In the novel, she is depicted as a very exotic, beautiful and intelligent looking woman. Her racial dilemma however has left her lonely, alienated and psychologically