Character Analysis Of Helga In 'Quicksand' By Nella Larsen

“An observer would have thought her well fitted to that framing of light and shade. […]. In vivid green and gold negligee and glistening brocaded mules, deep sunk in the big high-backed chair, against whose dark tapestry her sharply cut face, with skin like yellow satin, was distinctly outlined, she was—to use a hackneyed word—attractive.” (Larsen 30)

Throughout Nella Larsen’s Quicksand, Helga is portrayed as a woman of impeccable taste. Her luxurious possessions literally frame her in the opening paragraph of the novel. Helga, much like a skilled artist, is seen throughout her Great Migration to be creating a work of monumental proportions – a portrait of her own self. However, it soon becomes apparent that Helga is unsure of her identity, being “a pretty, solitary girl with no family connections” (33). Moreover, as a child of

miscegenation, consequently abandoned, she is unable to identify with a single race, thus the reader follows her as she constantly attempts to cross the colour line in hopes of to creating her identity through the artistic medium of apparel.

Helga’s identity can be seen slipping in and out of various styles of clothing in each new environment she finds herself in. Conscious of Modern society’s dress codes she adjusts her clothing’s hem lines, fabrics, colours and patterns, and in effect tailors her identity to fit the various roles society expects from her. Both Quicksand and Passing are swathed with the delicate details of aesthetic beauty, but these seemingly unimportant details are laden with symbolism, and resultantly define the characters which traverse the creased pages, revealing much more than gorgeousness. This essay aims to explore the ways in which Larsen alters W.E.D Du Bois’s

metaphorical veil in order to explore Helga’s complex racial identity in the modernising city. Furthermore, through this essay I aim to argue that this veil becomes literal in the various styles of clothing Helga choses to fashion, questioning if this artistic medium does truly enable her to reveal her true identity, or simply a portrait of a failed artist.
Larsen’s innate concern with this Modernist project can has be seen to stem from her own personal experiences as a biracial race female in New York in the early 20th century which “anchored a fascination with urban existence that both characterised and stabilized her adulthood” (Davis 209). The birth of fashionable dress can be traced back to the growth of the European city, which developed from the establishment of mercantile capitalism. However, with the turn of the 20th century a new type of fashion emerged which was “disassociated from the rigid behavioural codes that once sustained it” (Wilson 8). This meant that fashion was ultimately free to become a vehicle for not only aesthetic expression, but also for political rebellion, protest and social reform. Furthermore, industrialisation saw modern, mass produced fashion which allowed for a new kind of woman to emerge, one who no matter where she came from, or which class or race she was assumed into, could express and identify herself the way she felt fit. Therefore, at its most basic delineation fashion is that which is always rapidly changing, reacting to that which came before it – fashion is modernity. Helga’s project of self-creation is thus in its nature a modernist venture; defined by characteristics of novelty and aestheticization her journey for self-identification through apparel becomes a series of modernist artworks, each portrait depicting a new Helga, recreated to fit into society.