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Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl
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Thanks, Bookworm_Girl.
I was really thinking about the language and the way of thinking. (The difficulties associated with passing don't seem tied to Harlem of the 1920s.) But after reading those articles I see more of the importance of the setting on the characters.
By the mid-to-late 1920s we're well into the Harlem Renaissance, and this must make it a fairly optimistic time for Negroes in Harlem. The Wikipedia article says "Often Harlem intellectuals, while proclaiming a new racial consciousness, resorted to mimicry of their white counterparts by adopting their clothing, sophisticated manners and etiquette."
We are shown Irene leading an affluent life that (at least initially) seems hard to distinguish from what we might expect of a white woman of those times, and she has no need to pass for white, except on minor occasions as a matter of convenience. How easy it must be for Irene to look down on Clare, who gave up so much to get what Irene has achieved with no sacrifice at all.
But the Renaissance has only been going since 1918, it wasn't happening when Clare made her decision to pass as white and break free of her old life. When Clare meets her old friends she gets to see that Harlem has become a place of opportunity. How could Clare not be jealous that Irene should be handed this at no personal cost? Why shouldn't Clare think it's her right to take what she has already paid for?
Understanding the setting doesn't make me like the main protagonists any more than before, but I think I have a better understanding of their behaviour and it makes the story feel a little less artificial.
Which isn't to say the whole book is now clear and unambiguous, but at least some parts are less obscure than they were. Thank you.