The Tragic Duality of Helga Crane

Nella Larsen’s Quicksand intertwines elements of Maureen Murdock's Heroine's Journey, yet by the final chapters, it diverges sharply from the conventional resolution of this journey. The "union" phase, where the heroine typically reconnects with a lost part of herself and finds balance, is left seemingly incomplete for Helga, the novel’s protagonist. In Quicksand, Helga’s journey as a mixed-race woman in 1920s America is marked by a split between what she perceives as her “feminine” white identity and her “masculine” Black identity. Helga constantly shifts between the two, seeking a place where she can fully belong. According to the Heroine’s Journey, she should find a harmonious balance between these identities, emerging as a powerful woman confident in all parts of herself. Tragically, this resolution never comes for Helga.

Early in the novel, Larsen distinguishes Helga’s identities through her family background: her mother was white, her father Black, and she grew up with her mother’s family, experiencing neither pride in her Black heritage nor acceptance as white. From the start, Helga longs to fully embrace her Blackness while discarding her association with whiteness. She expresses disdain for “the injustices, the stupidities, the viciousness, of white people” and dreams of a life where she can unapologetically live as a Black woman (Larsen 45). She often wears bright clothes to celebrate her skin color and looks down on Black women who dress in neutral colors.

Later, in a stark contrast, Helga reconnects with her “feminine” side while in Copenhagen, where she is the only person of color. Immersed in her white relatives' privileged lifestyle, Helga observes that Black people “didn’t want to be like themselves. What they wanted, asked for, begged for, was to be like their white overlords” (Larsen 68). This inner conflict between two parts of Helga continues throughout the novel, leaving readers hoping she will find a middle ground.

However, Larsen concludes Helga’s journey not with empowerment but with disillusionment. By the end, Helga is left utterly lost, unable to fully embrace either her Black or white identity. Instead, she resigns herself to societal expectations of Black women in the 1920s. Despite her initial resistance, she marries a Black Christian man and bears many children, living a life that provides stability but lacks fulfillment. Larsen’s portrayal of Helga’s Heroine’s Journey offers a stark reminder that, for some, a perfect ending remains out of reach. By the novel’s end, Helga has gained a clear-eyed, yet bleak, understanding of her world – one that reflects the difficulty and grim reality for a woman of mixed race in a time that refused to accept her.