Quicksand: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism ed. by Carla Kaplan

Abstract

Reviewed by: Quicksand: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism ed. by Carla Kaplan Sharon L. Jones KAPLAN, CARLA, ed. Quicksand: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2020. 284 pp. $18.12 paperback. With Quicksand: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism, editor Carla Kaplan presents Nella Larsen's Quicksand (1928) as a ground-breaking text [End Page 312] due to protagonist Helga Crane. Kaplan writes that Helga is "one of the first truly 'intersectional' figures of women's literature, a character for whom the various strands of race, gender, class, and sexuality can never be disentangled (since all contribute to her misery)" (xxi). Readers will gain new insights about Larsen, an African American writer best known for the novellas Quicksand and Passing (1929), in relation to the past and the present. Kaplan's "Introduction: A 'Queer Dark Creature'" contextualizes Larsen's life and writing before, during, and after the Harlem Renaissance and Modernist period. According to Kaplan, "Quicksand propelled her into celebrity as one of only two black women—Jessie Fauset was the other—considered major fiction writers" (ix). Kaplan asserts that Quicksand differs from other texts by Black Modernist writers, stating "Quicksand is one of the grimmest novels in modern black letters, a 'queer dark creature' unequalled (until Richard Wright's Native Son, in 1940) in its pessimism" (ix). According to Kaplan, "Most importantly, Larsen's work is now prized for its portrayal of black female subjectivity, its depiction of the consequences of repressing women's sexuality, and for its representation of the social and psychological vertigo caused when identity categories break down" (xxxii–xxxiii). "A Note on the Text" includes textual history and biographical details about Larsen and is followed by "The Text of Quicksand." Quicksand focuses on its biracial protagonist, who faces challenges related to sexism, socio-economic status, and racial identity while living in different regions of the US and abroad (including Denmark). By the text's end, Helga Crane struggles to cope with being a wife and mother in a southern US town where she feels stifled. The useful footnotes to Quicksand include information relevant to characters, settings, symbols, and plot. "Contemporary Reviews" provides perspectives from critics about Quicksand and other texts. For example, W. E. B. Du Bois's favorable 1928 review "Two Novels" in Crisis compares Quicksand to There Is Confusion by Jessie Fauset and examines the role of Black womanhood in Quicksand. In contrast, Wallace Thurman's 1928 review "High, Low, Past and Present" in Pittsburgh Courier acknowledges Du Bois's praise of Quicksand but criticizes the unsympathetic portrayal of Helga Crane and Quicksand's ending. "Nella Larsen's Writings" features Larsen's mixed 1929 "Review of Black Sadie" in Opportunity in which Larsen criticizes T. Bowyer Campbell's Black Sadie for its repetitiveness yet praises its depiction of a Black woman achieving success. This section also features Larsen's 1930 short story "Sanctuary" (Forum), which focuses on a character harbored by the mother of a person he killed. "Correspondence" includes letters to other writers, including Carl Van Vechten as well as Gertrude Stein. The letters to Van Vechten comment on Jessie Fauset, James Weldon Johnson, Van Vechten's Nigger Heaven, Ethel Waters, and Edith Wharton's Twilight Sleep. The letters to Stein mention Carl Van Vechten and Paris. "Cultural Contexts" includes texts offering cultural commentary. Notable examples include Marita Bonner's 1925 "On Being Young—a Woman—and Colored" in The Crisis, which critiques racism and sexism, and Langston Hughes's 1925 poem "Cross" (The Crisis), which examines racial identity. An excerpt from "Cross" appears before Quicksand's first chapter, so the complete poem in "Cultural Contexts" could facilitate a deeper understanding of the poem's relevance to Quicksand. Sheila Kaye-Smith's 1922 "Mrs. Adis" from The Century Magazine focuses on Mrs. Adis, who provides shelter for Peter Crouch (who killed her son Tom). As Kaplan notes, Larsen faced an accusation that "Sanctuary" plagiarized "Mrs. Adis" (xxxi). [End Page 313] "Criticism" presents scholarship examining Quicksand from feminist, historical, biographical, and transnational perspectives. For example, Deborah McDowell's feminist critique in "The 'Nameless…Shameful Impulse:' Sexuality in Nella Larsen's Quicksand and Passing" (a reprinted excerpt...