Queenie Quotes

• “Oh, there were plenty men like me, wandering this small island, their heads cluttered with the sights they had once looked on. If you would listen then we would talk ­ widen your eyes with stories of the war and the Mother Country… Come, ask a question you have always wanted to know. The King ­ oh, a fine man, and Shakespeare too. Paved with gold, no ­ but, yes, diamonds appear on the ground in the rain (173).” – Gilbert
• “’She can’t understand what I’m saying….They’re not civilised. They only understand drums’” –
• “A shadow come to life” – Queenie pg.5-This has connotations of black people being almost ‘half’ alive and not being as goodas white people.
• “’She can’t understand what I’m saying….They’re not civilised. They only understand

drums’” – Queenie pg.5-We see the assumption that all white people made that black people are inferior to them and have no concept of language; they can only communicate using primitive methods.
• “A monkey man” – Queenie pg.6-Levy is showing how black people were viewed in an animalistic light.

This has connotations of them being savages, uncivilised and uneducated.
• “His lips were brown, not pink like they should be” – Queenie pg.6-Black people are abnormal and therefore inferior to white people. Alternatively it could show the naivety of people living Britain.
• “big nigger man” – Queenie pg.6-This casual racism is more shocking as it is a child using it, showing how racism was deeply rooted in English society so much so that children would use it.
• “It was warm and slightly sweaty like anyone else’s” – Queenie pg.6- Again Levy shows us the British assumption that as black people look different they must ‘work’ differently

too.
• “’Have you seen Sugar? She’s one of you.’” – Random woman to Hortense Pg.15-We see an ‘us’ and ‘them’ quality here and this distinction shows how differently black people were treated and viewed in 1940’s Britain.
• “this working white man could have thought me so stupid” – Hortense pg.16- As readers it’s here that we see the beginning of Hortense’s disillusionment of how life was like for black people in Britain and her surprise makes us sympathise more with her .
• “’You know about bells and knockers? You got them where you come from?’” – Taxi driver5 pg.17-Again we see the assumption of black people’s inferiority and primitiveness.
• “dark, brown walls. A broken chair that rested one uneven leg on a Holy Bible…torn……….curtain…rusty tap…two chairs-one with its back broken” – Hortense pg.20-21-Everything they have is broken and second hand and as it’s described as the “best” that could be find we feel even more shocked by the conditions that they are living in. This shock and sympathy we feel for Hortense is greater as we know what Hortense was expecting “white pillars”, “grand stairways”
• “her white glove is black” – Gilbert pg.28-Levy could be implying here that however much Hortense may want to live the life of an upper class white women, she will always be black and so can’t live the life she would want.
• “This light-skinned, green-eyed boy had looked the most trustworthy student” – Gilbert pg.68-Even amongst black people, those who are white are seen as superior and more “trustworthy”. This shows how black people have been oppressed and told they are inferior for so long that they had started to believe it.
• “Those white women whose superiority encircled them like an aureole” – Hortense pg.69-The word “encircled” implies that their “superiority” cannot be escaped and implies that in turn a black women is “encircled” by her inferiority.

• “‘if this Hitler man wins this war he will bring back slavery….We will work for no pay’‘I…. .work for no pay now,’” – Celia pg.71-This shows that although they were told that life would be worse if Hitler were in power and they would be slaves again. However Levy shows us that although not labelled as slaves black people were still treated as such.
• “Those men who left for the war with spirited cheer returned looking around them as bemused as convicts. In their ill-fitting suits or uniforms that would soon no longer be theirs”-The word “convicts implies that black people were being punished for a wrong doing and yet they had fought for “The Mother Country”, this provides the reader with a sense of injustice. Also the words “ill-fitting” imply that the “suits” weren’t made for them and black people were given anything to wear. The final sentence suggests that they will no longer “belong” to Britain, they had done their duty and then they should go

home.