LITR 5731:
Seminar in American Multicultural Literature: Minority
Sample
Student Research Project
Philip R. Jones
Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself”
and
Nella Larsen’s Passing:
Contrasting Views on American Equality
One very intriguing idea that exist between Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself,” and Nella Larsen’s Passing is the contrasting views on equality. Whitman strongly disagrees with all of the social restrictions that hinder the individual from experiencing the highest level of spiritual, physical, and psychological freedom and equality on all levels of human existence. Whitman also opposes all worldly suppressive entities such as discrimination based on race, class, culture and gender, and also the dividing barriers in society that separate individuals based on social and financial status. Whitman firmly believes that these suppressive entities and barriers suffocates the imaginative, passionate drive of the inner spirit ultimately preventing one from experiencing all desired facets of humanity great and small. In Passing, Larsen presents her audience with the many hardships that arise from one’s racial identity. She dramatically illuminates the dark, horrific, challenging obstacle of racial discrimination that many African Americans have faced, and currently face in current and modern day America. Larsen cleverly challenges us to acknowledge the powerful effects of “good hair” and “Fair skin” that is possessed by many African Americans of bi-racial ethnicity, and how these two features tend to be nothing more than a deceptive mask allowing many African Americans access to a variety of worldly privileges which would otherwise be denied if their true African ethnicity were known.
These contrasting ideas on equality tend to very interestingly relate to the idea of “The American Dream” and “The American Nightmare” with special emphasis on the “Color Code.” In “Song of Myself,” Whitman’s passionate, celebratory notion of humanity, freedom, and equality for all on all levels of life, and his heroic claim that no individual or group is separated by race, social or financial status, power, or external appearance is interestingly symbolic of “The American Dream.” In Passing, Larsen epitomizes “The American Nightmare” as she presents us with a more realistic view of equality. She exhibits equality as a dirty word and as a goal that is clearly unwelcome by the Caucasian community. In Larsen’s world, humanity is divided by ideas of racial superiority, social and financial status, and power. Larsen strongly objects to Whitman’s notions in an effort to expose his unrealistic, and highly Romanticized views concerning humanity and equality.
Whitman’s intense passion for freedom, equality, and egalitarianism is exhibited immediately in “Song of Myself” in a very refreshing and enlightening fashion. Right away he establishes the tone of “The American Dream” by asserting that he is on an equal level with all people regardless of race, financial or social status, and other factors that divide society: “I celebrate myself, and sing myself, / And what I assume you shall assume, / For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you” (1-3). Whitman is sharing his inspirational view of equality with the reader. He is suggesting that the reader is equally as intelligent as he is and that we as a society are united as one. Whitman is highly opposed of anyone living a life consumed by restriction, repression, or confinement as these dark entities tend to psychologically, spiritually, and emotionally suppress the mind, heart, soul, and spirit ultimately shattering all realms of freedom, creativity, and imagination. Whitman is also opposed to any entity which casts dividing factors among people because these dividers tend to situate all people on contrasting levels in life:
The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the
distillation, it is odorless,
It is for my mouth forever, I am in love with it,
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and
Naked,
I am mad for it to be in contact with me. (17-20)
In this passage, Whitman is not only exhibiting his passion for freedom and non-restriction, he is expressing his admiration for the atmosphere because it is outside, free, and non-confined for all levels of humanity to enjoy, unlike perfume which is bottled up and restricted. He specifically indicates in the line “I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,” that this is a place of serene and peaceful meditation where he can take off his social mask very freely and naturally. Whitman is playing no social role here and is completely surrendering his heart, mind, body, and spirit to the hands of nature and the reader. Interestingly, Whitman is also echoing the Romantics in this passage in the sense that he is exhibiting a unique, aesthetic oneness with nature as we witness in William Wordsworth’s nature poems. He appears to be in a sense “wedded to nature” in which his mind, body, and spirit is engulfed by a sublime feeling of awe causing him to be all in all with nature.
Whitman’s aesthetic sense of uniting his soul with nature, and his strong opposition to the authoritative entities of society that divide, restrict, and suppress the innate desires of freedom, equality, and the imagination is interestingly shown as a passionate self-association with the Union’s very ethnic, culturally, and socially diverse existence. Whitman appears to view himself as the actual human embodiment of our great Union’s unique ability to embrace all aspects of humanity regardless of racial, cultural, social, or financial differences:
Enclosing America, the poet unites its diversity in himself so that he comes to embody the union. Like the Union, the poet makes an equal place in his poetic microcosm for all “strata” and “interests,” for western and eastern, northern and southern states. And like the Union, too, the poet recognizes individual differences, beginning with those qualities distinguishing him from others, making him “a great master”, “complete in himself,” his soul, “president of itself always.” As a new kind of egalitarian master, balancing “sympathy” and “pride,” this poet has the conviction that he can perfect the work that the people of the United States started in their constitution, namely, “to form a more perfect Union.” (Levine 575)
In this passage, Whitman is imaginatively detaching himself from the conventional qualities of love and acceptance found within heart and soul of the average mortal being. He has mentally surpassed the imaginative passion of the human and is aesthetically viewing himself as a cathedral of heroic egalitarianism. Whitman has captured himself within the ideal essence of his “American Dream” as he has become one with the Union’s diverse, passionate quest to unite all entities regardless of race, creed, or color, ultimately transforming him into the epitome of unconditional unity, love, and equality for all.
Along with Whitman’s passionate message of equality and freedom, the concepts of balance and reality are also major aspects of “Song of Myself” that he attempts to expose to the heart and mind of his readers. Whitman’s primary goal in this poem is to enlighten us as a society to the reality of the existence of good and evil, and the fair and unfair aspects of the world which we cannot change. Although we as a society cannot change these worldly facts of life, we must acknowledge and accept them graciously and move forward with a positive, loving, embracing attitude as we encounter these differences:
There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now. (40-43)
Here, Whitman is exhibiting the spiritual side of himself. He is expressing to the reader that there are many physical, spiritual, and emotional facets of life that are mysterious by nature which currently, and will always lack perfection. Whitman believes that we must strive to mold these physical, spiritual, and emotional imperfections as close to the level of perfection as possible while simultaneously maintaining close contact with reality. Whitman is aspiring to achieve balance and equality among all humanity in this passage. He asserts that, “To elaborate is no avail, learn’d and unlearn’d feel that it is so,” expressing to the reader that it is normal to see the good and evil in the world and to acknowledge them, but he cautions us to refrain from uniting them as one (48).
A very significant symbol that Whitman uses in the poem that clearly exhibits his strong love and dedication to equality on all levels of life, and his passionate commitment to egalitarianism is grass:
Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the
vegetation
Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,
And it means, sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,
Growing among black folks as among white,
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I
recieve them the same.
And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves. (105-10)
Whitman is clearly expressing his awe of how beautiful, diverse, and non-judgmental grass is. He is also interestingly equating it to the innocence and unconditional acceptance of a child. Like a child, grass is innocent and uncorrupted by the ignorant, suppressive, authoritative entities of society. It is innately good, inviting, and available to be embraced by all who comes into contact with it. Grass is a key symbol in Whitman’s passionate beliefs of equality for all because he views it as Mother Nature’s unique embodiment of equality and diversity. Whitman idealizes grass because it is very simple and grows diversely in the yards of blacks, whites, the rich and the poor. Grass does not discriminate against anyone which characterizes it as the ideal in Whitman’s eyes. Interestingly, Whitman is illuminating his aesthetic Romantic tendencies in the passage as he is once again captivated in a state of awe by an aspect of nature which strongly echoes the ideas of Romantic nature poet William Wordsworth. Grass tends to transcend Whitman to feeling of existing all in all with nature. It is the aspect of Mother Nature that possesses the most simplistic, earthly, wholesome essence which spontaneously grows across all states, countries, and cities unconsumed and unrestricted by suppressive, authoritative forces of the universe. It is a sublime, natural entity which is the unifying blanket of earth that unites all human and non-human entities together as one. To Whitman, grass is the cathedral of democracy. Herbert J. Levine asserts in his essay that,
Contextually, then, ‘the grass is itself a child . . . the produced babe of the vegetation.’ Allegorically, it is both a personal emblem of the poet’s disposition, ‘out of hopeful green stuff woven,’ and an impersonal emblem of God’s designing hand, ‘Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners . . . Homiletically, the grass teaches a democratic lesson, ‘Growing among black folks as among white,’ a lesson the poet then enacts by recording Americas’ names regardless of race: ‘Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I recieve them the same.’ (Levine 153)
Whitman’s very natural, pure, and humanistic view of grass very interestingly illuminates the “Color Code” section of objective 1 as it tends to symbolize how grass is not only a strong representation of diversity and unity, and is blind to skin color, it is ultimately Mother Nature’s teacher enlightening us to how it is as equal and diverse as the human race. It is unique in the sense that it disregards ethnic, social, and financial differences. It is the cultural carpet that provides lush greenery of landscape and an awe inspiring sense of beauty to all. This is Whitman’s “American Dream,” for all human entities of this universe to coexist on an immortalized level of equality.
Two major sections of the poem thoroughly exhibit Whitman’s passion, aesthetic drive for equality on the highest levels of humanity:
The married and unmarried children ride home to their
thanksgiving dinner,
The pilot seizes the king-pin, he heaves down with a strong arm,
The mate stands braced in the whale-boat, lance and harpoon
are ready,
The duck-shooter walks by silent and cautious stretches,
The deacons are ordain’d with cross’d hands at the alter,
The spinning-girl retreats and advances to the hum of the big
wheel,
The farmer stops by the bars as he walks on a first day loafe
and looks at the oats and rye. (266-72)
Whitman is expressing here that the lowliest of humanity are equal and paralleled to the privileged. No one is divided by separating barriers such as race, financial, or social status. He is expressing his utmost respect for the diverse groups of Americans at work in this scene, and also embracing and admiring the diverse types of jobs and careers that not only shapes, but ultimately defines America and the human race as a whole. Moreover, Whitman is glorifies all of humanity and demolishes all barriers of separation, restriction, and freedom which relentlessly suppresses humanity’s desire to unite and blend as one race, the human race.
The second major section of the poem that aesthetically, spiritually, and emotionally embodies Whitman’s passion for equality and diversity is a scene in which he humbles himself to all walks, colors, creeds, and cultures of humanity. Whitman very graciously welcomes these people in an effort to eliminate any type of division or restriction among humanity:
This is the meal equally set, this is the meat for natural hunger,
It is for the wicked just the same as the righteous, I make
appointments with all,
I will not have a single person slighted or left away,
The kept-woman, sponger, thief, are herby invited,
The heavy-lipp’d slave is invited, the venerealee is invited;
There shall be no difference between them and the rest.
(372-77)
In this passage, Whitman expresses his belief that the popular is equal to the unpopular, and the sophisticated to the unsophisticated. His view of equality, freedom, and egalitarianism is illuminated to the fullest extent in this section of the poem because he thoroughly breaks down the barriers that divide people by race, external image, social and financial status, and good and evil which ultimately restricts them from experiencing the sublime, unique, powerful essence of unlimited equality, freedom, and the aesthetic harmony of being united with the multitude of diversity which shapes America.
Nella Larsen’s Passing presents us with a contrasting view of equality which exposes Whitman’s views as unrealistic and highly irrational in terms of their fantasy-like, romanticized essence. In Passing, Larsen presents her readers with the cold, dark, discriminatory barriers of racial, and social and financial status that African Americans have struggled against for many generations in an effort to gain equality to the Caucasian community. She exposes Whitman’s egalitarianistic view of “The American Dream” as ultimately a deceptive mask which hides the racially discriminatory “American Nightmare” that plagues America across the globe on a consistent basis. Larsen exhibits through the character of Irene Redfielf the barrier of skin color. In part one of “The Encounter,” Irene is overcome with fear that she has been identified as a Negro and will be dismissed from the classy, elegant environment of the Drayton. Irene mumbles quietly to herself: “Did that woman, could that woman, somehow know that here before her very eyes on the roof of the Drayton sat a Negro?” (Larsen 16). Larsen clearly illustrates here how race is very much an important issue in our society, and whether someone is Caucasian or African American can unfortunately make the difference on how humanely they are treated.
The mere appearance of a person’s ethnicity is illuminated here as being of the utmost importance in terms of emotional and physical comfort level when one is situated within an environment where a certain ethnicity is considered the ideal: “They always took her for an Italian, a Spaniard, a Mexican, or a gipsy. Never when she was alone, had they even remotely seemed to suspect that she was a Negro. No the woman sitting there staring couldn’t possibly know” (Larsen 16). In this passage, Larsen challenges us to acknowledge how Irene’s ethnic appearance as a white woman is the integral characteristic that allows her to remain at the Drayton:
Both Irene’s admission that she has never been questioned when passing and her failure to register the possibility of the other woman “being” something other than she seems suggest that race norms work through assumptions of whiteness . . . In a society in which white is the ideal or norm, one is assumed to be white unless one looks black. Looking black becomes a deviation from the normalized state of being white. The invisibility of the mark of whiteness is exactly the mark of its privilege. (Rottenberg 438)
This passage dramatically illuminates how black and white is firmly associated with the notions of “good and bad” or “evil and angelic.” Irene’s intense fear that Clare Kendry’s eyes had penetrated through her outer Caucasian appearance and realized her true African American ethnicity, clearly exhibits how Irene views her African ethnicity as a kind of forbidden monstrosity which is prohibited within white society. Here, we witness how white is universally symbolic of aesthetic purity, cleanliness, and the angelic essence of the ideal ethnicity of the human race, and black holds very dirty, evil, and dehumanizing connotations. Larsen very clearly reveals Whitman’s view of equality, diversity, and freedom for all as an irrational, unrealistic fantasy. Regardless of how passionate our desire is for equality of all humanity regardless of race, creed, color, or financial and social status, Larsen presents us with the unfortunate, realistic truth that society is indeed cursed with these dividing factors on many levels. Larsen is illuminating here how discrimination of color is the ultimate “American Nightmare” that has plagued our nation for generations.
Larsen exhibits the high level of importance of skin color in our society through the character of Clare Kendry. Clare expresses her desperate desire for the finer things in life to Irene, and her willingness to surpass any boundaries necessary to acquire them:
Then too, I wanted things. I knew I wasn’t bad-looking and that I could ‘pass.’ You can’t know, Rene, how, when I use to go over to the south side, I used almost to hate all of you. You had all the things I wanted and never had had. It made me all the more determined to get them, and others. Do you, can you understand what I felt?” (Larsen 26)
Clare is expressing that she was forced to deny her entire identity in order to acquire happiness and prestige. Interestingly, Larsen is highlighting here how the act of “passing” ultimately results in a great sacrifice of one’s innermost self. While Clare acquire the beautiful, elegant, materialistic aspects of the white community, this acquiring of the finer things in life failed to grant her the complete sense of happiness experienced by her close friend Irene. Larsen challenges us here to acknowledge the fact that while white skin may be considered the ideal and the key to acquiring a lifestyle of luxury, elegance, high social status etc, the aesthetic sense of joy and completeness that yields from the full acknowledgement and comfort of one’s true identity is a unique luxury which no one can put a price on. Unlike Irene, Clare chose to suppress a major portion of her identity for financial and materialistic gain, ultimately resulting in an enormous void within her soul.
Larsen attempts to play with the emotions of her readers as Clare recollects upon how her aunts forced her to deny her African American ethnicity as an adolescent. On one hand, we despise Clare because she is a highly shallow, materialistic hypocrite who is thoroughly consumed with selfishness and exhibits no respect for others. On the other hand, we sympathize with Clare because much of her selfish, shallow, materialistic personality and character traits were born as a result of nurture from her ignorant, racist aunts rather than nature and as a result, these self-absorbed values are all she can associate with as an adult woman. Larsen very creatively directs her readers into a psychological way of thinking about Clare. Interestingly, Clare attempts to capture the reader’s sympathy as she speaks of the horrendous ignorance, and racial suppression she endured from her aunts as an adolescent:
The aunts were queer. For all their Bibles and praying and ranting about honesty, they didn’t want anyone to know that their darling brother had seduced - ruined, they called it - a Negro girl. They could excuse the ruin, but they couldn’t forgive the tar-brush. They forbade me to mention Negros to the neighbors, or even to mention the south side. (Larsen 26-27)
This passage illustrates that Clare has been taught that her ethnicity is very dirty, nasty, ugly, and a complete taboo within white society. She is taught that she must not acknowledge her African American heritage under any circumstances in an effort to avoid societal ridicule and utter embarrassment. The ignorance of her aunts has taught her that her bi-racial ethnicity is a dirty family secret which must never be exposed.
The low self-esteem that Clare has acquired is clearly shown by the fact that she married Jack Bellew under false pretenses. Jack marries Clare under the assumption that she is a white woman. Clare did not correct his assumption for fear of not accomplishing her goal of acquiring high social and financial status, and an extravagant, luxurious lifestyle. As a result, she has subjected herself to countless days of depression, loneliness, and unhappiness because she has sacrificed not only her African American ethnicity which completes her identity, but also a major part of character and personality which ultimately results in a shattered self. In the “Re-Encounter” section of the novel, Clare tearfully speaks to Irene exhibiting her longing for the part of her life that she has buried: “You don’t know, you can’t realize how I want to see Negroes, to be with them again, to talk with them, to hear them laugh” (Larsen 71). Larsen cleverly penetrates into the emotional depths of her readers as she presents Clare Kendry in a very melancholy state, crying out for the life and people that once made her life whole.
The most dramatic example in the novel of how Larsen exposes Whitman’s ideas of equality and diversity as unrealistic and irrational is shown at Clare’s tea party. This scene is a very explosive example of how Larsen’s “American Nightmare” of racial prejudice, hatred, and ignorance powerfully dominates American culture today. Irene, very subtly disguising her anger and outrage, asks Clare’s husband Jack if he dislikes black people, and he responds with no hesitation:
You got me wrong there, Mrs. Redfield. Nothing like that at all. I don’t dislike them, I hate them. And so does Nig, for all she’s trying to turn into one. She wouldn’t have a nigger maid around her for love nor money. Not that I’d want her to. They give me the creeps. The black scrimy devils. (Larsen 40)
Out of the many dramatic scenes in this novel, these racially degrading comments that Larsen has John Bellew express, tends to powerfully embody her realistic views of the world and humanity. We also see here how Whitman’s view of egalitarianistic view of humanity existing on equal levels in society regardless of race, skin color, and financial and social status is firmly revealed to be highly unrealistic and fantasy oriented on the highest level.
One significant idea that Larsen illuminates in this very dramatic scene is the mysterious act of silence that Irene exhibits upon being blasted with the powerful words of hatred and ignorance by John Bellew. Rather than defending her African American ethnicity, she chooses to remain frozen in a state of silence which ultimately causes her to experience a loss of identity:
Why, in the face of Bellew’s ignorant hate and aversion, had she concealed her own origin? There is a linguistic connection to be made here, between speaking and existence, between silence and ceasing to exist . . . By refusing to speak in the moment of Bellew’s onslaught, Irene’s black self is literally disappeared from the room, leaving only her “white” body to signify for her. Without her voice to constitute her blackness, however, that body can only “speak” whiteness, producing a crisis of identity for Irene, a self-identified “race woman,” which cannot easily be resolved. (Jenkins 139)
In this passage, Larsen very clearly illuminates Irene as a kind of Janus figure utilizing her outer Caucasian ethnic characteristics to deceive others of her true, innermost African American ethnicity. This scene also highlights the issue of “voiceless and choiceless” in the sense that Irene was forced to remain silent as if she didn’t have a “voice” in response to Bellew’s hatful comments as a result of her “choice” to “pass” as something other than her true self. Larsen challenges us to realize that as a result of Irene’s dramatic choice to portray a Caucasian identity, she has sacrificed her true identity and her mortal existence as an authentic human being. She has become a hollow, transparent entity whose “whiteness” has ultimately killed her true, innermost “blackness.” Here, we witness how “The American Nightmare” of being forced to migrate away from the true self in an effort to gain societal acceptance, is a deadly choice that ultimately suffocates, and dehumanizes the self on all levels resulting in a shattering of the spiritual, emotional, and psychological heart of one’s mortal existence.
Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself” and Nella Larsen’s Passing are two very compelling pieces of literature that captures many of the views and attitudes concerning, race, culture, discrimination, and color that we are faced with as a society on a daily basis. As the theme of equality is highlighted in both of these works on very intriguing, inspiring, and dramatic levels, both authors are in constant battle with each other in an effort to win the reader’s vote as to which view of humanity, equality, and diversity is the most rational, valuable and electrifying to society as a whole. While Whitman presents his readers with a very unique, creative, imaginative, and inspiring perspective of unconditional equality, freedom, egalitarianism, and diversity as the ideal “American Dream” which engulfs the American people on a daily basis, Larsen very boldly contradicts Whitman exposing his views as irrational, unrealistic, and absurd on all levels. She awakens her readers to the notion of how Whitman’s so-called “American Dream” is ultimately a fraudulent notion creatively shielding the American people from the dividing barriers, racial and social discrimination, and the deep level of hatred that exist among various cultures in our society, which is ultimately revealed to be “The American Nightmare” that has plagued humanity for generations. Larsen’s underlying message is that we as a society must view the world not in a negative light, but in a very realistic, logical, and thoughtful one. Although we as a society will never be able to completely abolish racial division, discrimination, hatred among cultures, and other negative forces that are continuously crippling our society, we must refrain from uniting these forces and only acknowledge them with the utmost bravery and confidence.
Bibliography
Jenkins, Candice M. “Decoding Essentialism: Cultural Authenticity and the Black Bourgeoisie in Nella Larsen’s Passing.” Rocking Mountain Review of Language and Literature 60 (2006): 25-52.
Larsen, Nella. Passing. New York: Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2003.
Levine, Herbert J. “Song of Myself As Whitman’s American Bible.” Modern Language Quarterly: A Journal of Literary History 48 (1987): 145-161.
Levine, Herbert J. “Union and Disunion in Song of Myself.” American Literature: A Journal of Literary History, Criticism, and Bibliography 59 (1987): 570-89.
Rottenberg, Catherine. “Passing: Race, Identification, and Desire.” Criticism: A Quarterly for Literature and the Arts 45 (2003): 435-52.
Whitman, Walt. “Song of Myself.” Anthology of American Literature. Ed. George McMichael. New Jersey: Printice Hall, 2004. 1804-1851.
