Nella Larsen (1891–1964)
Auteur de Passing
A propos de l'auteur
Nella Larsen was associated with the Harlem Renaissance. She also worked as a librarian and a nurse in New York City, pursuing nursing after her brief, successful writing career until her death in 1964. Larsen's mother was Danish, and her father was West Indian; she used her experience as the child afficher plus of middle-class parents in a mixed marriage to create characters in two novels who are stranded, caught between two cultures and unable to feel wholly at home in either. In each of Larsen's novels, the heroine suffers suffocating constrictions of her identity in both African American and white European culture. These crises in both Quicksand (1928) and Passing (1929) are further complicated by the heroine's quest for sexual as well as social identity, and both novels end without hopeful resolution. Both contain autobiographical elements, but Quicksand, the more successful, reproduced in fictional form many of the circumstances of Larsen's own early life. Although her work had been out of print for many years, she has recently been rediscovered. (Bowker Author Biography) afficher moins
Œuvres de Nella Larsen
The Nella Larsen Collection; Quicksand, Passing, Freedom, The Wrong Man, Sanctuary (2010) 6 exemplaires
Passando-se 5 exemplaires
Oeuvres associées
Daughters of Africa: An International Anthology of Words and Writings by Women of African Descent from the Ancient… (1992) — Contributeur — 159 exemplaires
Calling the Wind: Twentieth Century African-American Short Stories (1992) — Contributeur — 100 exemplaires
Centers of the Self: Stories by Black American Women, from the Nineteenth Century to the Present (1994) — Contributeur — 28 exemplaires
The Unforgetting Heart: An Anthology of Short Stories by African American Women (1859-1993) (1993) — Contributeur — 23 exemplaires
Ebony Rising: Short Fiction of the Greater Harlem Renaissance Era (2004) — Contributeur — 16 exemplaires
Étiqueté
Partage des connaissances
- Nom légal
- Imes, Nella (married)
- Date de naissance
- 1891-04-13
- Date de décès
- 1964-03-30
- Sexe
- female
- Nationalité
- USA
- Lieu de naissance
- Chicago, Illinois, USA
- Lieu du décès
- New York, New York, USA
- Lieux de résidence
- Chicago, Illinois, USA (birth)
New York, New York, USA (death)
Denmark - Études
- Fisk University
- Professions
- novelist
short story writer
Nurse
librarian - Prix et distinctions
- Guggenheim Fellowship (1930)
- Courte biographie
- Nella Larsen was born in Chicago to a black father and a white Danish emigrant mother. Her father died when she was young and her mother remarried and had another daughter. Most of the rest of her early life is unknown. She trained as a nurse and as a librarian, and married Elmer Imes, a physicist then living in New York City. She became a celebrated novelist and writer of the Harlem Renaissance, beginning with her 1928 novel, Quicksand. It was followed by Passing (1929). The couple were members of a circle of professionals, intellectuals, and artists that included Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Du Bois. Nella Larsen won a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1930, intending to write more novels, but never did. By 1938, she and her husband were divorced and she was no longer in touch with her friends or her publishers. She took nursing jobs beginning in 1944 and lived a solitary life for the next 20 years until her death.
Membres
Discussions
6. Passing by Nella Larsen à Backlisted Book Club (Mars 2022)
Group Read, August 2020: Passing à 1001 Books to read before you die (Août 2020)
Critiques
Passing par Nella Larsen
Like a lot of modern american the end is the best part!!!! kinda reminiscent of ethan frome
This is a book I will want to reread when I’m not overwhelmed with teaching and my own school. I rushed through it to get done, some of this short classic dragging along. I was mad Clare didn’t stand up for herself against her husband but also couldn’t imagine being in her shoes. I would never want to hide my history even though I’m so called “passing”.
An interesting book but with no likable characters, which I'm sure was intentional. Passing as white is not the only kind of passing going on here. The novel presents a point of view we don't usually get, but still this is a book obsessed with class and appearances.
At the beginning of Part 2, when Irene is processing her visit in Chicago with Clare and her husband... I notice that Irene seems more critical of Clare than of the husband. I'm torn between interpreting this as a woman being more judgmental of a woman than of a man... and interpreting it as, "Well, that's what you can expect from a white man. Clare should know better." And she judges herself for standing by Clare and not telling off Clare's bigoted husband.
Since this book was originally published in 1929, it's not surprising that the dialogue reminds me of films from the 1930s and 40s. Sometimes I'm picturing it as a black and white film (urgh, no pun intended).
Page 72: Women in 18th century France included Bluestockings who hosted literary salons--not just women who fluttered fans and flirted with swains. And who started the French Revolution? Peasant women furious at the outrageous expense of bread.… (plus d'informations)
Since this book was originally published in 1929, it's not surprising that the dialogue reminds me of films from the 1930s and 40s. Sometimes I'm picturing it as a black and white film (urgh, no pun intended).
Page 72: Women in 18th century France included Bluestockings who hosted literary salons--not just women who fluttered fans and flirted with swains. And who started the French Revolution? Peasant women furious at the outrageous expense of bread.… (plus d'informations)
Listes
Five star books (1)
Backlisted (1)
AP Lit (1)
Overdue Podcast (1)
Female Author (1)
The Zora Canon (2)
Zora Canon (2)
Favourite Books (1)
1920s (1)
Schwob Nederland (1)
Read These Too (1)
Prix et récompenses
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Statistiques
- Œuvres
- 11
- Aussi par
- 18
- Membres
- 4,900
- Popularité
- #5,131
- Évaluation
- 3.8
- Critiques
- 139
- ISBN
- 155
- Langues
- 8
- Favoris
- 10