Nella Larsen, Novelist of the Harlem Renaissance

Nella Larsen, Novelist of the Harlem Renaissance - Cover

A Woman's Life Unveiled

by Thadious M. Davis

496 pages / 6.00 x 9.00 inches / 12 halftones

African-American Studies | Literary Criticism / African American | Women's Studies

Paperback / 9780807120705 / May 1996

Nella Larsen (1891–1964) is recognized as one of the most influential, and certainly one of the most enigmatic, writers of the Harlem Renaissance. With the instant success of her two novels, Quicksand(1928) and Passing (1929), she became a bright light in New York’s literary firmament. But her meteoric rise was followed by a surprising fall: In 1930 she was accused of plagiarizing a short story, and soon thereafter she disappeared from both the literary and African American worlds of New York. She lived the rest of her life—more than three decades—out of the public eye, working primarily as a nurse. In a remarkable achievement, Thadious Davis has penetrated the fog of mystery that has surrounded Larsen to present a detailed and fascinating account of the life and work of this gifted, determined, yet vulnerable artist. Davis deftly situates the writer within the broader politics and aesthetics of the Harlem Renaissance and analyzes her life and work in terms of the current literature on race and gender. 

Thadious M. Davis is Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of English at Vanderbilt University. She is the author of Faulkner’s “Negro”: Art and the Southern Context.

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