The wife of his youth
In the story of “The wife of his youth” by Charles W. Chesnutt goes into detail about how the blacks were having problems with the society of the whites. This story was written after civil war. Where were a group of blacks who started this society called “The blue vein society”. The group of people would get to together talk about how the whites could except them and for the blacks to except them would be a step back for them. The main character of the story is Mr. Ryder. He was in charge of the blue vein society, and everybody in the society look up the him. In this paper I will show how the people of the blue vein society had problems with their identities.
First let me talk about the story. The main characters where Mr. Ryder, Dixon, and Liza Jane. There is a society in this town where they have to be black but you have to seen blue veins to be in this club. Mr. Ryder is a well known person in the town, but he wont tell anybody about his past. Later in the story, Miss. Dixon is a person from the north, she is more educated, more whiter and Mr. Ryder thinks that she is the greatest thing that you could ever see. So he is going to have party in her and tell everybody that he would like to merry her. In the middle of afternoon Mr. Ryder is sitting in his front yard, and there is a old lady walking by and she asked him if he had seem a man. The lady name is Liza Jane. She goes into great detail about her husband. She tells Mr. Ryder how they were merry on the farm, and that they would be together forever. She tells him the whole story, how he was a free man and the owner of the farm was going to sell her husband to another farm to make some money. So Mrs. Jane told her husband about the news and that he had to go and she would find him later. So this man runs away. And now we are back to present time and Mrs. Jane tells Mr. Ryder that she was been all over the south looking for this man and it has been about 20 to 25 years that he had left her. And then Mrs. Jane leaves and Mr. Ryder said that he will kept a look out for this. Later that night Mr. Ryder was having the party. He told his blue vein society friends about the story that Mrs. Jane had told him. He asks them what would they do. His friend said that is most be true love and they would do anything to have something like that. Then Mr. Ryder said that he is the one and this is the lady who has been looking for me all of those years.
“”I have no race prejudice,” he would say, “but we people of mixed blood are ground between the upper and the neither millstone. Our fate lies between absorption by the white race and extinction in the black. The one doesn’t want up yet, but may take us in time. The other would welcome us, but it would be for us a backward step.”“ C. W. Chesnutt is trying to say that at that time the mixed blood were in the middle and they known that they want to be in the whites society but it will take some time, they just cannot be accepting over night. The civil war is just over and there are still tension over the slaves and blacks. They known that the blacks would take them with open arms and would have no problem with them. So they were between the millstone. Olson 3
For the most part they knew that they did not want to with the blacks even tho they were black as well or mix blood.
Another identity problem was the blue vein society. They were a mix blood and they thought that the whiter you are the better you would do in life. They thought that if you were black you were in the past and that whites were in the future. To be black was extinction and to be white was absorption. Throughout the story they were mostly saying that the whiter you are the better you would do. But I think that statement is funny, because at the end of the story Mr. Ryder left Dixon who whiter then he was, had a education and was a beautiful woman that the whole town want. And he went to go get Mrs. Jane who black as could be and had no education. I just found it odd that throughout the story they were talking about how great it is to be later skin and being blacker is trouble for you.
These are the reason why were are problems with the identity. They go out the whole story talking how good it is to be later or white, but if they think about for a second all of that had no effect. To this day there are some mix culture but there are still cultures that do not get alone and will never get alone. Yes over time the whites will expect them but it is not what they thought it would be. I hate to say this but when you think of a black person you don’t think that he or she is a doctor or lawyer. You think that white race are more like that and the blacks are more robbers and other things like that. This is why I feel that the blue vein society had an identity problem.
Works Cited
1. Charles W. Chesnutt. “The Wife of His Youth.” New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc.1899.
2. Class talks