Intertextual Geographies of Migration and Biracial Identity: Light in August and Nella Larsen's Quicksand

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Abstract

This chapter examines the notion of context by comparing William Faulkner’s novel Light in August (1932) with Nella Larsen’s Quicksand (1928), and argues that the two authors have more in common than one might assume. More specifically, it considers how reading Faulkner alongside Larsen may help to resituate the former’s “Southern” writing about race in wider national and transnational contexts. The chapter also discusses a notion of intertextuality that leans on Roland Barthes’ reading of every text as “a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centers of culture.” It suggests that both novels interrogate racial ideology in America, particularly the “one drop rule” that originated in the South, and furthermore, looks at the characters’ adoption of an understanding of racial identity that defines them as “black.”
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationFaulkner and formalism : returns of the text : Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha, 2008
EditorsAnnette Trefzer, Ann J. Abadie
Place of PublicationJackson, Mississippi
PublisherUniversity Press of Mississippi
Publication date2012
Pages144-162
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2012

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