Transformation in Nella Larsen’s Passing, Essay Example

The construct of the transformation of American society, as well as characters in various materials of literature, are prevalent. Various characters in these materials are undergoing some changes. The exposure of their true sexual and racial identities does indeed result in Clare deciding whether she will find salvation in confrontation or death. Through evidence of Clare and Irene’s attraction towards each other and Irene’s failed attempts to protect the secret of Clare’s true race to her husband, Nella Larsen’s Passing shows the consequences one faces when they are not able to hide their true identities from cruel and judgmental society.

In order to understand why Irene and Clare have secrets to hide from society, one must first understand what those secrets are. As Freud would say, Clare proves herself to be Irene’s sexual object; “the person whom sexual attraction proceeds” (Freud 2). Irene regards this attraction with intense frustration. When the novel commences Irene obtains Clare’s letter, who ardently illustrates her feelings for her friend; “For I am lonely, so lonely…cannot help longing to be with you again, as I have never longed for anything before” (Larsen 7). Upon receiving this letter from her friend Clare, she fumes at the thought of being forced to face this person whom she tried to deny her feelings for; “…words stood out from among the many paragraphs of other words, bringing with them clear, sharp remembrance, in which even now, after two years, humiliation, resentment, and rage were mingled” (Larsen 7). One could argue that such short tempered and angry rage can only come from somebody trying to deny their true feelings.

Author Mary Mabel Youman takes this theory further in her essay A Study in Irony when she discusses Irene’s fear of sexuality; lack of Irene’s compliance with her Puritanical morality appears to threaten her well-being in the middle-class. Irene, therefore, considers sexuality as an element that identifies one’s socioeconomic stratum and not an intrinsic human nature (Youman 339). Youman is trying to explain that Irene resents these sexual feelings she has towards Clare because it is indicative of a lower class, and not the upper-middle-class women who are expected to only be attracted to their husbands. When Irene observes her friend Clare for the first time in Chicago, it is obvious that her observations go well beyond an average description; “An attractive looking woman, was Irene’s opinion, with those dark, almost black, eyes and that wide mouth like a scarlet flower against the ivory of her skin” (9). One does not say such things when observing a companion. Rather, Irene seems to be admiring her with great affection and attraction.

This idea of sexual attraction, however, troubles Irene and makes her feel ashamed. In an essay, Compulsory Heterosexuality authored by Adrienne Rich provides a discussion on sexual suppression. “I am concerned here with two matters as well; first, how and why women’s choice of women as passionate comrades, life partners, co-workers, lovers, the community has been crushed, invalidates, forced into hiding and disguised” (Rich 229). Within this essay, she explains how women’s true feelings and sexual identities are hidden in a world which demands “compulsory heterosexuality,” meaning the cultural assumption that men and women are heterosexual and the inability to fit this description means you will be rejected by society. Nella Larsen’s Passing shows the consequence of living in a society which rejects one’s true sexual desires. The consequence is Irene’s internal frustration with herself, and her inability to express the way she feels and risk losing her middle class, secure family. In other words, her sexuality threatens her way of life.

Irene is so afraid of losing her proper middle-class status in fact, that she will suppress sexuality within her own family to ensure each member of her household is conducting themselves properly. In Gayle S. Rubin’s essay Thinking Sex, she explains what she calls the popular attitude of the negativity of sex. Rubin states that“Western cultures generally consider sex to be a dangerous, destructive, negative force. Most Christian tradition, following Paul, holds that sex is inherently sinful” (11).  This Western attitude about sex being sinful and something that must be suppressed is what creates Irene’s fear of her family learning too much about it. When Irene fears that her son Junior is learning about sex and crude jokes in school, she brings the matter to her husband Brian’s attention, trying to convince him to take him elsewhere for his education and this can be linked to Irene’s remarks,“I’m terribly afraid he’s [Junior] picked up some ideas about things—some things-from older boys you know” (Larsen 42). With regards to this excerpt, Irene is trying to explain that she is terrified her son Junior will learn about sexuality too early and this will damage his upbringing and possibly bring embarrassment to her family. One could argue that suppressing the idea of sex from her children makes her feel better due to the fact that she is trying to suppress the sexuality within her own life as well.

In an essay Black (W)holes and the Geometry of Black Female Society, Evelynn Hammonds elucidates the way in which female sexuality, particularly that of an African American woman, is silenced; “Black women’s sexuality is often described in metaphors of speechlessness, space, or vision, as a “void” or empty space that is simultaneously never visible (exposed) and invisible where black women’s bodies are always already colonized” (132). In other words, there is little room in the society these characters live in to accept unconventional relationships. Therefore, Irene’s identity is silenced; and with it her ability to protect and help her friend Clare.

The second most significant tragedy in Passing lies in Clare’s inability to embrace her true racial identity. As a result of Clare’s secret about her race and Irene’s attempts to suppress the race of her family, Irene creates tension with her husband and Clare’s life is cut short. Irene is a woman of proper middle-class stature. While she is understood to be a black woman in her own community, she easily “passes” for a white woman in other places in society and occasionally takes advantage of this. In fact, the first time she encounters Clare in Chicago she is sitting in a restaurant which most likely would not have welcomed her had they known she was black. She becomes so self-conscious of being conspicuous in the restaurant, in fact, that she felt exposed when Clare observed her from across the restaurant; “Instead, it was Irene who was put out. Feeling her color heighten under the continued inspection, she slid her eyes down. What, she wondered, could be the reason for such persistent attention?” (Larsen 10).  These moments of insecurity and doubt are what causes her to do her best to conform and blend into the “white” culture of her city, especially when it comes to raising her children.

In addition, Irene’s husband Brian deals with a conflict in his desire to move to Brazil, which Irene objects to so fervently that the issue torments her:

“Was she ever to be free of it, that fear which crouched, always, deep down within her, stealing away the sense of security, the feeling of permanence, from the life which she had so admirably arranged for them all, and desired so ardently to have remained as it was? That strange, and to her fantastic, notion of Brian’s of going off to Brazil which thought unmentioned yet lived within him; how it frightened her and, yet-how it angered her!” (Larsen 40).

In her eyes, moving to Brazil means losing all of the things she has at home which makes her a proper middle-class family; a husband who has a steady job, children who are enrolled in respectable schools, and a well-established household. These are all things which help her blend into the more high-class society she so desperately wants to be a part of. Her husband’s desire to move and uproot all which makes them a normal American family creates tension in their marriage and causes yet another sacrifice in Irene’s attempts to suppress her race.

In addition, despite the fact that Irene feels obligated to protect the racial identity of Clare, she fails to do this and her exposed secret leads to her death. Although Irene resents Clare sees her method of “passing” as distasteful, she decides not to tell her husband’ “But she shrank away from the idea of telling that man, Clare Kendry’s white husband, anything that would lead him to suspect his wife was a negro…” (Larsen 69). This excerpt is attempting to explain the fact that Irene understands that Clare is masking a secret so great that it cannot be hidden. While she has the power to expose Clare, she refuses, bound to the obligations of protecting someone of her own race. Similar observations can be attributed to the words of Roderick Ferguson’s essay Race, “In other words, race both accounts for the logic by which institutions differentiate and classify, include and exclude, and names the processes by which people internalize those logics” (192). This means that Irene understands exposing Clare means taking her entire world away and the way that world treats her. And due to her obligation to protect someone of her own race, she remains silent. However, Clare’s husband discovers her real race in an accidental way and forces his wife to confront him about her enormous lie. Instead of facing him and attempting to explain herself, Clare chose death. While some believe Irene was the one who pushed her in order to free herself and her family from the troubles which Clare has caused them, one could argue that Clare knew she could not live in a world which now knew of her true race, so she escaped it the only way she knew how. Author Kate Baldwin explores this theory in her essay The Recurring Conditions of Nella Larsen’s Passing; “Certainly the “second ending” allows us to ascertain that Clare’s death was not a murder in any intentional sense. Rather the uncertainty of Clare’s demise represents a challenge to the very self-enclosed and group identity-affirming narrative that passing, as a ritual tale in the name of racial difference, recounts” (468). This passage explicates that the sad account with regards to the ending of Clare and the tension surrounding Irene’s marriage is purposely positioned into the narrative to exemplify the impacts individuals have to bear when settling in a society which forces them to keep their racial and sexual identities a secret.

The tragedy of Clare falling out the window seems to be a choice. Her husband, who believed her to be white, discovered her true racial identity and caused her to confront two options; live with the consequences of her lie or escape from the truth. She chose death, and with it, her inevitable fate was sealed. Passing serves as a tragic tale which shows the world of the terrible sacrifices people have to make to conceal their identities. Whether they are racial or sexual identities, there are radical choices which cannot survive in a judgmental society. This society, no matter how desired by both Irene and Clare, is not one which can sustain any sexual or racial truths. As a result, this way of life ended up stripping both women of their sanity, and one of her life.

Works Cited

Baldwin, Kate. The Recurring Conditions of Nella Larsen’s Passing. New York: W.W Norton, 2007. Print. Passing: The Norton Critical Edition.

Ferguson, Roderick A. Race. New York: NYU, 2007. Print. Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler.

Freud, Sigmund. Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality. Troup, James Stracheg. New York: Basic Books, 1962.

Hammonds, Evelynn. Black (W)holes and the Geometry of Black Female Society. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print. Critical Inquiries: Introduction to LGBT Studies.

Larsen, Nella, and Carla Kaplan. Passing: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism. New York: W.W. Norton, 2007. Print.

Rich, Adrienne. Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence. New York: Routledge, 1993. Print. The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader.

Rubin, Gayle S. Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality. New York: Routledge, 1993. Print. The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader.

Youman, Mary M. A Study in Irony. New York: W.W Norton, 2007. Print. Passing: The Norton Critical Edition.