Irene Redfield, "Passing"
Irene is the protagonist of the Larsen’s short novel Passing. Married to a doctor and enjoying a life a comfort, she is a member of Harlem’s elite of mixed racial background whose light pigmentation comes to embody the novel’s titular thematic exploration of “passing” as white: she represents the polar end of the spectrum that only passes for the sake of immediate convenience.
Clare Kendry, "Passing
Clare represents the other extreme of the exploration of passing. She is also of light enough pigment to pass for white but takes things to the limitations of the time by marry a white man who does not realize she of mixed racial heritage.
Helga Crane, “Quicksand”
Larsen’s novel Quicksand is also about the biracial experience of women in America (juxtaposed with that of Denmark for a brief period) and how lighter skin can be both a help and hindrance. She is educated, working for a time as a teacher, and is pursued romantically by a number of impressive prospects. Inexplicably, she winds up metaphorically barefoot and pregnant to a backwoods preacher.
Julia Romley, “The Wrong Man”
Julia is the protagonist of a story that is all about the plot rather than the character. She is a fairly elusive figure about whom just the wider aspects of pertinent facts are revealed: she is an impulsive romantic given to falling for the wrong kind of man. And the entire narrative moves inexorably toward the story’s closing line which follows a confession during a chance meeting at a party: “She had told the wrong man.”
Unnamed Man, “Freedom”
“Freedom” is another plot-driven narrative in which everything moves incessantly toward a shocking closing line. Although not given a specific identity, the unnamed protagonist is much like Julia Romley in that it is the information not offered directly which makes him come alive to the reader. This connection is vital because that last line is a keeper: describing in cold factual detail how he chooses to kill himself in an extreme act of defenestration.
