Nella Larsen, Novelist of the Harlem Renaissance: A Woman's Life Unveiled

by Thadious M. Davis

Nella Larsen (1891–1964) is recognized as one of the most influential, and certainly one of the most enigmatic, writers of the Harlem Renaissance. With the instant success of her two novels, Quicksand (1928) and Passing (1929), she became a bright light in New York’s literary firmament. But her meteoric rise was followed by a surprising In 1930 she was accused of plagiarizing a short story, and after 1933 she disappeared from both the literary and African-American worlds of New York. She lived the rest of her life―more than three decades―out of the public eye, working primarily as a nurse. In a remarkable achievement, Thadious Davis has penetrated the fog of mystery that has surrounded Larsen to present a detailed and fascinating account of the life and work of this gifted, determined, yet vulnerable artist.

In addition to unraveling the details of Larsen’s personal life, Davis deftly situates the writer within the broader politics and aesthetics of the Harlem Renaissance and analyzes her life and work in terms of the current literature on race and gender. This book, with the prodigious amount of new material and insights that Davis provides, is a landmark in African-American literary history and criticism.

Genres: Biography, History, Race, Psychology, Nonfiction, African American, Female Authors

496 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1994

About the author

Her poetry has been published in various journals and anthologies in the USA, including Obsidian, Pushcart Prize IV: Best of the Small Presses (ed. Bill Henderson, 1979) and Black Sister: Poetry by Black American Women, 1746-1980 (ed. Erlene Stetson, 1981) and is collected in Emergence. In the 1980s she co-edited (with Trudier Harris) several volumes of the Dictionary of Literary Biography dealing with African-American writers.

(from Daughters of Africa, edited by Margaret Busby)

Reviews

[Nascha]

Another well noted biography on Nella Larsen, an intriguing novelist from the Harlem Renaissance period. Larson, the biographer, does a great job of detailing Larsen's life and giving tidbits and details not found in most other biographies. Very good read for those interested in learning more about Nella Larsen.

[Bill Fox]

Thadious M. Davis’s biography of Nella Larsen is best when Davis is writing about Larsen during the Harlem Renaissance and after, essentially from the 1920s until the end of Larsen’s life in the 1960s. Davis analyzes Larsen’s life, novels and short stories. She is or was an English professor and it shows.

Having read Quicksand, Nella Larsen’s autobiographical first novel, I was curious to know more about her life. I read George Hutchinson’s biography first because it was more recent. After finishing Hutchinson's book I was still curious enough about Larsen to read Davis’s book.

Hutchinson references this book in his biography of Larsen. He came to some very different conclusions, especially about Larsen's early life, which Davis does not cover particularly well. Hutchinson, writing later, was able to find documentation that had eluded Davis.

Although I found much of Davis's book to be quite interesting, the beginning of Larsen's life was sparsely covered.

Davis writes a lot about the era in which Larsen's childhood took place without saying much about Larsen herself. Larsen's first 21 years are covered in 48 pages. Those 48 pages include the ethnic and racial composition of Chicago's population, the addresses and occupations of Larsen's Chicago neighbors as well as their names. Regarding the Larsen family, Davis writes about various changes in their names and what that may have meant, but it is clearly speculation. Davis's speculation continued as to why Larsen was expelled from the Fisk Normal School after what was essentially Larsen's junior year of high school. Davis writes about the possibility of pregnancy and marriage, but provides no evidence and never mentions it again.

Also, I thought Davis used Larsen's fictionalized autobiographic information, such as that in Quicksand, to support her opinions, but rejected that information when it did not. For example, Davis did not find or believe the evidence that Larsen lived in Denmark twice for three years each, despite it being what Larsen wrote about Helga Crane in Quicksand. Davis acknowledges that Larsen could read and write Danish, but wrote she probably learned it in Chicago.

My last problem with Davis's biography is that she minimized Larsen growing up in a white family and its significance in Larsen deciding who she was, whether or not the rest of the world agreed.

I had not intended to read a second biography of Nella Larsen, but after the first couple of chapters, I was drawn into the story of Larsen and the Harlem Renaissance.