Imitation of Life*

In Fannie Hurst's novel, “Imitation of Life,”1 the travails and destinies of two families are portrayed in a parallel fashion. Two young women, both widows, one white, the other colored; both have children, each a little girl; both tremendously successful and secure in a material way; yet both failing in the end to achieve the one great quest for happiness; their life but an imitation. Two problems are developed in the novel. One refers to marriage and frigidity, and the capacity of the woman to sublimate. The other problem, and one which is dealt with more intimately, is the psychology of bi-racial relations. In a subtle Tolstoian fashion the principle is advanced that in our American society, at least, a colored person, regardless of how white he may appear, cannot divorce his racial identity and pass the color barrier without heaping upon himself miseries and conflicts, anguish and suffering that in the end must defeat the original purpose and bring about disaster on the transgressor.

The story may be told briefly. Bea Chipley, later Mrs. Pullman, is born at the turn of the century, of parents reared in the victorian spirit of the nineties. Brought up to believe that a woman's place is in the home, and that the comforts of others must come before her own, she marries without love and conceives without passion. The death of her husband leaves her alone with a helpless, paralytic father and a small baby, Jessie, both entirely dependent upon her. By persistent work she builds up a little fortune, missing love in the meantime. And when, at last, with growing leisure, the desire is awakaned and there comes an opportunity to enjoy life and love, her daughter, made selfish and charming by her mother's wealth, appropriates her mother's lover.