66 pages • 2 hours read
Nella LarsenQuicksand
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1928A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Character Analysis
Helga Crane
Helga Crane is a beautiful young woman of mixed racial descent who has no memory of her father, a man of color, and recalls her Danish mother as having been emotionally remote. When the reader first meets Helga, she is unhappy with her teaching post at a Southern boarding school for Negro children. Educated and intelligent, Helga feels superior to her colleagues at the school, whom she senses are overly acquiescent to inherent racism within the institution. She makes the impulsive decision to resign immediately and break her marriage engagement, arranging immediate relocation to Chicago. This pattern of impulsivity and disdain for others characterizes Helga’s life, and it ultimately leads her into a disastrous marriage to a rural minister.
Helga both craves and disdains human relationships. While she feels chronically ostracized as a result of racism, she responds to individuals of color who treat her with kindness (for example, Anne Gray) by eventually lashing out at them and breaking the friendship. Her attitude toward love and sexuality are conflicted; she experiences erotic attraction to men, such as Dr.Robert Anderson, yet, she is repulsed by them if the prospect of marriage is broached, as is the case with Axel Olsen.Her solution to conflict in any relationship is to flee; in one case, she actually relocates to another country. She feels entitled to expensive material items being provided for her and unending attention and praise from those around her. In the end, Helga always feels superior to, and isolated from, her compatriots. The only sexual relationship into which she enters is with a man whom she considers to be her inferior on every level: the Reverend Pleasant Green.
Dr. Robert Anderson
The young, idealistic principal of Naxos School, Anderson re-appears in Helga’s life at various times in the novel. She questions whether she is in love with him, yet angrily withdraws from Anne Gray’s house when he calls upon her in Harlem. Conversely, Helga lusts for him and experiences conflict when he marries Anne Grey. After drinking heavily at a party, Anderson kisses Helga and she responds passionately. Subsequently, she is angered by her thoughts of him and humiliated when he apologizes for his behavior rather than pursuing her sexually.
Mrs. Hayes-Rore
A wealthy, light-skinned Chicago widow who hires Helga as an assistant. Financially independent and well connected, Mrs. Hayes-Rore secures employment for Helga in New York. She introduces Helga to Anne Grey, who invites Helga to share her elegant Harlem townhouse.
Mr. Rev. Pleasant Green
Minister of a fundamentalist Harlem Church, Pleasant is a well-meaning, naïve man who is seduced by Helga while she is reeling from her apparent rejection by Robert Anderson. Green and Helga marry, relocate to Alabama, and have several children in quick succession. Helga is initially charmed by his simplicity, as well as that of rural life and the comfort of religion. All of this is reversed as she experiences the exhaustion involved in birth and child rearing. Female congregants assist with the care of their children and cooking for the Reverend when Helga becomes unable to meet these responsibilities.
Aunt Katarina/Uncle Poul Dahl
Aunt Katarina is Helga’s maternal aunt, who lives in Copenhagen, Denmark with her wealthy husband, Poul Dahl. She has always wanted Helga to live with her and welcomes her into the family home, where she exhibits great generosity to Helga.
Uncle Peter
Peter is Helga’s maternal uncle, who finances her education and has been kind to her throughout her lifetime. He provides her with the funds to relocate to Copenhagen in order to reside with Aunt Katarina.
Axel Olson
Olson is a famous portrait artist in Denmark who paints Helga’s picture. He initially propositions Helga, and then proposes marriage to her. She rejects both offers.
