Helga Crane

 Helga Crane is a interesting woman. She is constantly in conflict within herself to defer her happiness. Once happiness is within her reach she incredibly snatches defeat from the jaws of victory. She is an example of the "tragic mulatto" to me. Unable to fully exist in the black or white worlds she exists in between them, like a certain kind of purgatory if you will. This is not her own fault. In 1920's America she can not those to claim her whole identity as a biracial woman because society won't all ow it. Her skin color doesn't allow her to be white and her conscious will not allow her to fully embrace in being black. She is torn within her very being as to who she is. Her response to Axel Olson's proposal that she "doesn't believe in mixed-race marriage" reveals the tear within herself. Helga is a product of interracial marriage and as a result she doesn't believe on herself. Her self-loathing throughout the novel is her being, the yin and the yang of her conscious, being unable to unite into her true self. I believe that is why she denies herself happiness when is within her grasp. I believe she is only truly at peace with herself when she is lost in thought daydreaming what could of been. This way she can exist as who she wants to be, a biracial woman without racist societal ostracization, in her mind's eye.Tragic mullato, indeed.