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Novella · Easy-medium

Passing

Nella Larsen · 1929 · United States

Irene and Clare reconnect in 1920s America. Clare has been passing as white, and their relationship becomes charged with race, class, secrecy, envy, desire, and danger.

Notes and Misconceptions

The title also points toward social passing, emotional passing, marital passing, and the performances required by respectability.

The ending is deliberately unstable. Treating it as a simple mystery to solve weakens the book.

Best Path

Harlem Renaissance, identity, short classics

Reading Paths

  • Short Classics That Have Teeth

    Compact books that do more damage than their length suggests.

  • Women, Constraint, and Social Performance

    Works where etiquette, education, marriage, status, and taste become systems of pressure.

Tags

americanharlem-renaissanceraceidentitygendernovellapsychologicalentry-point