| Like her contemporary Jessie Redmon Fauset, | | | | (Wall 92). While working at Tuskegee, Larsen |
| Nella Larsen also fictionalized middle class society; | | | | discovered that "along with their academic and |
| however in Larsen's works, there are | | | | vocational training, students were also schooled in |
| undercurrents that imply middle class values are | | | | subservience and docility" (Wall 92). Larsen left |
| not always 'good.' Nella Larsen's only two novels, | | | | Tuskegee after one year. She returned to New |
| Quicksand (1928) and Passing (1929) were 'novels | | | | York, where she quickly became discontented |
| of passing' but unlike their predecessors, these | | | | with nursing and obtained a position as an |
| two novels are "more complex and ambitious" | | | | assistant with the New York Public Library; this |
| (Davis 560). In these works, Larsen "explores the | | | | move put her in contact with the New Negro |
| relationships between appearance and reality, | | | | intelligentsia (Wall 92). |
| deception and unmasking, manipulation and | | | | Larsen's personal life, like her characters, exhibits |
| imaginative management, aggression and | | | | a continuous quest to establish an identity for |
| self-defense" (Davis 561). Perhaps Larsen is able | | | | herself. But Larsen, if she ever did succeed in her |
| to delve deeper into the consciousness of people | | | | quest for a sense of self, adroitly concealed it |
| torn between two worlds because she herself | | | | from her contemporaries and from the rest of |
| had experienced living in both the 'white' world and | | | | the world. This concealment of her self is |
| the 'black' world. | | | | described by Wall in an interview with a reporter: |
| Larsen's mother was an emigrant from Denmark, | | | | The interview concentrated on more personal |
| and her father was from the Virgin Islands. During | | | | concerns. The "unforgivable sin" was being bored, |
| her early childhood, she lived in a "white | | | | so [Larsen] selected only amusing and natural |
| working-class neighborhood of Chicago," and | | | | people, not too intellectual. She would never |
| attended an elementary school which consisted | | | | "pass," because "with my economic status it's |
| mainly of the "children of German and | | | | better to be a Negro. So many things are |
| Scandinavian immigrants" (Wall 91). However, Wall | | | | excused them. The chained and downtrodden |
| reports that Larsen suffered "alienation" in her | | | | Negro is a picture that came out of the Civil War." |
| home life, and was "ostracized at school and in | | | | And while she claimed to be "not quite sure what |
| the neighborhood" (Wall 91). | | | | she wanted to be spiritually," she knew she |
| In her teen years, Larsen attended Wendell Phillips | | | | "want[ed] things - beautiful and rich things." (Wall |
| High School, and later "enrolled in the high school | | | | 120). |
| department of Fisk University in Nashville, | | | | Wall describes many more instances of Larsen's |
| Tennessee" which put Larsen among middle class | | | | flippancy in public, detailing the "considerable |
| African Americans (Wall 92). But Larsen left Fisk | | | | lengths" that Larsen utilized to "project a frivolous |
| after only one year, apparently "she was no | | | | image" (Wall 120). The reasons for Larsen's |
| more at home in an all-black community than she | | | | deceptive image is unclear, but Wall surmises that |
| had been in a white one" (Wall 92). After leaving | | | | "behind its mask, one supposes, [Larsen] felt safe" |
| Fisk in 1908, until she enrolled at New York's | | | | (Wall 120). This "masquerade of femininity" is a |
| Lincoln Hospital Training School for Nurses in 1912, | | | | major theme in Larsen's novels, as also is |
| there exists no evidence of her life in the | | | | transgressing social, racial, and gendered |
| intervening four years (Wall 92). Larsen says that | | | | boundaries. The themes Larsen employs mark her |
| she spent some time in Denmark attending the | | | | as a Romantic novelist. |
| University of Copenhagen, but Wall asserts that | | | | Bibliography |
| "in fact, Larsen did not leave the United States" | | | | Davis, Thadious M. "Nella Larsen." The Oxford |
| (Wall 92). Wall further states that what Larsen did | | | | Companion to African American Literature. Eds. |
| in that period of her life "remains a mystery," that | | | | William L. Andrews, Frances Smith Foster, and |
| Larsen "went to great lengths to conceal" (Wall | | | | Trudier Harris. Oxford: Oxford University Press, |
| 92). | | | | 1997. 427-28. |
| After graduating from nursing school in 1915, | | | | Wall, Cheryl A. Women of the Harlem |
| Larsen accepted a position as an "assistant | | | | Renaissance. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, |
| superintendent of nurses at Tuskegee Institute" | | | | 1995. |