The Erotic Over/Undertones of The Letter

In Nella Larsen’s Passing, not only does the physicality of the letter symbolize racial passing, but it also embodies the erotic undertones present in the novel. Deborah McDowell claims, “Though, superficially, Irene’s [narrative] is an account of Clare’s passing for white and related issues of racial identity and loyalty, underneath the safety of that surface is the more dangerous story—though not named explicitly—of Irene’s awakening sexual desire for Clare. The narrative traces this developing eroticism in spatial terms” (xxvi). Donavan Ramon similarly posits, “For both Larsen and Roth, the link between passing and anonymous letters is surprisingly grounded in revelations about sex, rather than revelations about race” (Ramon 54). While I disagree that the story of Irene’s “awakening sexual desire” takes precedence over that of Clare’s racial passing, McDowell and Ramon provide us with a compelling framework—sexuality—for analyzing the spatiality of the letter. Frankly, Irene does not even try to hide her sexual desire but instead overtly references her longing for Clare continually throughout the novel. Irene employs a plethora of sexually charged terminology in regards to Clare: she uses forms of the word “caress” in regards to Clare nine separate times, she describes Clare’s mouth five times, and she characterizes Clare as “seductive” or “seducing” three times in Passing (Larsen). Yet, the most intense allusions to her desire arise in Irene’s reactions to Clare’s letters.

The novel begins immediately with one of these loaded letters. Irene, after opening all her mail except for one “last letter,” holds the “long envelope of thin Italian paper” in her hands (Larsen 1). Although the letter lacks a return address, she recognizes its sender immediately. As Irene opens Clare’s letter, “brilliant red patches” appear on her cheeks and she recalls “That Time in Chicago” (Larsen 3). Almost as if Irene remembers an illicit affair, she blushes at the mere mention of Chicago. Clare also shares a similar impression of their past meeting: she describes herself as “longing to be with you again” and as having a “terrible, wild desire” (Larsen 3). Ramon suggests, “Her letter allows us to question her sexuality, as she addresses Irene not as a friend but as a long-lost lover” (Ramon 53-54). Even beyond its contents, the letter and envelope in their physicality represent Irene’s desire. McDowell famously describes the letter as a “metaphoric vagina which Irene hesitates to open” (McDowell xxvi). The letter, “furtive” and “flaunting,” contains the “danger” that both Clare’s passing, as well as her homoerotic desire, represents (Larsen 1). The letters (as well as Clare as a character) thus signify a sexual passing (“straight-passing”) as well as this racial passing. Irene projects her desire for Clare onto the letter; the letter functions as a synecdoche for Clare’s passing in both race and sexuality. Moreover, Irene both dreads and eagerly anticipates the opening of the letter. Joanne Wagner connects Irene’s emotional confliction to the gothic notion of the sublime: Clare’s existence “evokes a terrifyingly desirable response from Irene akin to the emotions evoked by the sublime described by Edmund Burke” (146). The letter elicits both terror and awe simultaneously.

Furthermore, this notion of the sublime fuels Irene’s fetishization of the letter. Freud claims, “The fetish is instituted some process occurs which reminds one of the stoppings of memory in traumatic amnesia … It is as though the last impression before the uncanny and traumatic one is retained as a fetish” (3). Rather than possessing a literal “castration complex” as Freud also poses, Irene fetishizes the letter (and, consequently, Clare) because it acts as a repository of her conflicting desires (3) The letter additionally functions as a recreation of her reunion—her last impression—with Clare during “That Time in Chicago” (Larsen 3). It is this battling between desires that compels Irene to so resent Clare. This internal battle “unhinges” “the security that anchors her very ontology” (Wagner 145). Wagner claims Irene’s “racial and sexual” anxieties lead to Clare’s tragic, but imminent, demise (145). Whether or not one believes Irene causes Clare’s ambiguous death, Clare nevertheless capsizes Irene’s static notions of sexuality and race. She remains caught “between distrust and admiration, between fear and envy” (Balkun 99). Because Clare’s subversion of the color-line renders it obsolete, her existence suggests we must question what other ideological divisions remain unfounded.

-MD