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Thadious M. Davis. Nella Larsen, Novelist of the Harlem Renaissance: A Woman's Life Unveiled. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State UP, 1994. 520 pp. $34.95 cloth/$17.95 paper.
Reviewed by
Jacquelyn Y. McLendon College of William and Mary
One usually thinks of an unveiling as a fairly simple task, accomplished in a single, effortless movement. Such is not the case, however, with the metaphorical unveiling that takes place in Thadious M. Davis's biocritical book Nella Larsen, Novelist of the Harlem Renaissance. For scholars and students who have long awaited a substantial study of Larsen and her writings, Davis's book does not disappoint. The culmination of years of careful and considerable research, it solves many of the mysteries surrounding Larsen's life and work, while simultaneously creating a few. This latter fact is not at all disturbing to those of us whose interest in Larsen is animated to some extent by her mystique. Yet many of the confounding issues regarding her birth and death, certain familial relations, her creative endeavors, as well as her place among the 1920s Harlem literati are thoroughly treated in this study.
In addition to the "Introduction" and "Conclusion," the narrative portion of the book contains four major sections, which are further divided into chapters. The first section, covering the years 1891 through 1919, traces Larsen's birth, childhood, and family life in Chicago, as well as her young adulthood and the events that led up to her marriage to Dr. Elmer Samuel Imes, a research physicist. Davis portrays the years 1920 through 1927 in the next section as literary apprenticeship years, emphasizing Larsen's entry into both Harlem's social scene and its world of arts and letters. Although the third section covers the fewest number of years, 1927-1930, it is one of the most significant, for it examines in great detail Larsen's achievements as a novelist. The last section, of course, traces the remainder of Larsen's life until her death in 1964. Not far short of 500 pages in length, the narrative also contains photographs, and three appendices include a list of book reviews of Larsen's two published novels, Quicksand (1928) and Passing (1929), and a chronological list of all her published work.
In her introduction, Davis sees Larsen's life and writings as "enigmatic," clearly in need...