The
Third Generation
by
Chester Himes
First published by
The World Publishing Company
1954
A Family Divided
A Defiant Woman
Proud, Beautiful—Almost White
Could She Find Happiness
by Denying Her Negro Blood?
Struggling to pass as white, a dominating woman of mixed blood turns against her dark-skinned husband and dramatically clashes with her son, her family, and her world.
Frustrated by her husband’s devotion to his race and repelled by his physical presence, Lillian Taylor looked to her son, Charles, to fulfill her dreams. Between mother and son raged a heart-breaking love and an agonizing hatred which twisted their lives—and drove Charles to sordid depths in his effort to escape his mother’s desperate hold upon him.
Charles’s mother looked white and felt white, but she was unalterably black and she hated it. From his mother, Charles inherited his light skin and his rage—a rage that would catapult him past two societies into a violent no-man’s-land of self-destruction.
Here is a compelling novel of a family groping for a chance at happiness and security—thwarted by the false pride and rebellious desires of an embittered woman. Told with frankness and raw fury, this is the dramatic story of a beautiful, defiant woman whose hatred of her Negro heritage made her despise her dark-skinned husband and drive her son to debauchery and crime.
“Chester Himes’s The Third Generation is by far the most intense and compassionate probing of the psychological predicament of a middle-class Negro family yet written.”
—Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man
“There is much tragic power in Himes’ new novel. The Third Generation is a strong addition to his growing list of books…”
—Chicago Sunday Tribune
“…shows how increasingly firm a position he deserves among American novelists.”
—New York Times
“A searingly powerful novel by “the best black novelist writing today.”
—Chicago Tribune
For Jean
“…for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God,
visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon
the children unto the third and fourth
generation of them that hate me.”
—EXODUS 20:5
1
SPRING WAS IN THE AIR. The bright morning sunshine had dried the dew and warmed the ground, and crocuses, bordering the front brick walk, bloomed in yellow flame. Rosebushes along the front picket fence were heavy with buds, and the tiny lacquered leaves of the spreading elderberry tree trembled as if in ecstasy. Everything seemed dazzlingly clean and dressed for an occasion. Beyond the vivid green of the sprouting grass the small frame house glistened with fresh white paint.
The faces of two small children pressed wistfully against the front windowpanes gave eyes to the house. It was a pleasant house, and one could imagine it having eyes, and smiling, too, on such a morning. Professor Taylor rented it from the college president.
Upstairs were three comfortable bedrooms, and downstairs the living room, library, dining room and kitchen, all furnished tastefully as befitted a teacher’s home. But the library, more than any of the others, revealed both the endowments and pretensions of Professor and Mrs. Taylor. It contained four large, mahogany-stained bookcases filled with mail-order deluxe editions, leather-backed, gilt-lettered volumes, known as “sets.” A set of Thackeray sat atop a set of Dickens, and a set of Longfellow nudged a set of Poe; a set of Roman Classics vied with a set of Greek Classics, and a set of the Encyclopedia contested the place of honor with a set of the Book of Knowledge. They were understandably very proud of their library. With the single exception of the president’s, it was the only one in the community, and his was not nearly as “complete.”
Occasionally Professor Taylor would recline there in his easy chair and nod over a volume, the brightly burning gas mantle hissing him awake from time to time. Or he would have his cronies in for a glass of elderberry wine and pace back and forth, recounting some story. But the children really enjoyed it. Thomas, at eleven, loved to read, while the tots, five-year-old William Lee Jr. and Charles Manning, sixteen months younger, were enthralled by the pictures. For her part, Mrs. Taylor preferred to read in the living room because of the grand piano. Music had always been her sanctuary and the nearness of the piano gave her a sense of security. Besides, owning a grand piano had always seemed to her indicative of good breeding.
The dining room was rarely used except for Sunday dinners or when they had company. Most of the time they ate in the kitchen at a table covered with printed oilcloth. It was a large bright kitchen looking onto the back garden, equipped with a huge wood-burning range. Twice weekly a woman came in and did the washing and heavy cleaning, but Mrs. Taylor did her own cooking.
At the precise moment the children were staring so longingly at the front yard, she paused in the act of wiping the dishpan to listen. It was not like them to be quiet. Hastily, she hung the pan on its nail beside the table and went forward to investigate. They pounced on her instantly, tugging at her skirt in their excitement.
“Mama, can we go out and play? Can we go out and play?”
“May you,” she corrected, “not can you. And you must call me Mother—how many times must I tell you?”
“Mother…May we, Mother? May we go out and play?”
“Let Mother see first,” she said, crossing to the window as they clung to her. It would be a blessing if they could, she thought—they were like caged tiger cubs.
For an instant her gaze went toward the entrance to the college, directly across the street, flanked by fieldstone pillars. It was an old college with a fine tradition and had been founded by a regiment of Negro soldiers who had fought in the Civil War. The campus was enclosed by a high thick hedge but there was a knoll beyond and she saw several shirt-sleeved students hurrying along the paths. Then she glanced appraisingly at the blue, cloudless sky. It promised to be a beautiful day, the first warm day of spring.
“Yes, children, you may go out for an hour before lunch,” she consented, but called them back as they dashed off. “You must wear your woolen playsuits. There’s still a chill in the air and Mother doesn’t want you to catch colds.”
A few minutes later, watching them run down the steps, she breathed a sigh of relief. All winter long she had had them under her feet. She had never completely recovered her health since the birth of Charles, and there had been times during the dull winter days as they ripped and romped through the house, screaming at the tops of their voices, when she had felt on the verge of nervous prostration.
It was an inviting yard, free of the hazards—stone menageries, sundials, birdbaths, fishponds and rock gardens—that cluttered the more pretentious yards along the street, and she had no fear of the children hurting themselves. But as they dashed wildly about, they seemed so reckless, so filled with explosive energy, she could not repress a mild fear. Should any harm befall them now, when she had nothing else to live for, she would die, she thought.
The children loved the yard. To them the house was a great stone castle and the yard an immense kingdom. Sometimes they imagined the house a fort. Then the yard became the great plains where the redskins roamed. They were always the Indians—“wild Indans,” their mother called them. They’d charge the house, shrieking wildly, and beat against the front stoop with sticks in an effort to break down the stockade gates and scalp the palefaces. It struck their mother as a little strange that they should always want to be the Indians. It seemed to her that at times their own white blood should predominate and they should want to be t
he palefaces. She disliked this game most of all. She was afraid it might encourage them to hate white people. She wanted them to grow up to love and respect fine white people as she did. And besides, it was such a bloodthirsty game and made her nervous. She hoped that during this summer they’d learn to play another game, or at least play with the toys their father had made for them. She reminded herself to have Mr. Taylor bring their wagon from the shed.
For a moment they paused before the gate, looking about to see if she was watching them.
“Don’t you dare swing on that gate,” she called. “You know I’ve expressly forbidden you to open it.”
They lingered for a moment longer, testing her determination. Seeing them in that perspective, she noticed with a sense of shock how they had grown since the summer before. William had already grown above the latch but Charles was crowding him fast. They’re shooting up like weeds, she thought. William would soon be of school age. Her gaze lingered on him for a moment, and she contemplated his resemblance to his father. His complexion was a flat, muddy brown, and he’d inherited his father’s features—and also his father’s kinky hair. She felt a mild surge of resentment. She hated to think that even one of her sons would resemble his father, although she knew many people considered Professor Taylor personable, recalling wryly that she herself had once thought him quite dashing.
Actually, away from his home, Professor Taylor was seldom looked upon with such photographic detachment. Only his wife saw him as a short, black man with a wiry, simian body, the bowed legs and pigeon-toed stance of great Negro athletes. But to her, the stigma of his blackness was relieved somewhat by his well-formed head, large, hooked nose and flaring nostrils, which she liked to think of as being Arabic. He was an active man with a facile expression, and others usually saw him on the move, laughing, talking, screwing up his face in a listening attitude, or doing something with his hands which held their attention. In a community where the majority of people were black, his color appeared commonplace, and he wore good clothes which gave him an air of distinction.
Most persons thought him lovable. He had the guile and intuition of the born comedian and could be extremely entertaining, yet he was never quite a clown. Along with an innate servility, which he had almost completely submerged beneath an aggressive demeanor, he had a strong and bitter pride. But unlike many proud men, who carry their pride in silence, he was boastful, and was never so pleased as when recounting with gestures some incident in which he had emerged heroically. He loved to rear back on his heels, his toes pointing inward, unconsciously scratching his head, and boast of what he’d told the college president, the local political boss, a white store clerk, or some similar person in a role of traditional superiority. Deep in his heart he wanted to be a rebel. Had he ever become a hero in the eyes of his wife he might have been a leader. He had the physical courage. Often he thrashed grown students half again his size. But his wife and the circumstances of his life had put out much of his fire. For the most part he was disarmingly ingratiating, not only toward his superiors but toward most persons.
Mrs. Taylor detested this latter characteristic most of all. Anything which, to her way of thinking, savored of being submissive sickened her. Of late she had noticed in William an expression of vague constraint as if he were holding himself back, which seemed to reflect his father’s submissive attitude. It troubled her.
On the other hand, Charles was gleeful and spontaneous with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes; he caused her more anxiety though he gave her more delight. Also, his skin was of a lighter complexion. She thought of it as “olive-colored,” similar to the complexions of southern Europeans. In reality it was the rosy, sepia hue common to mulatto children. He had a round, smiling face with a small, straight nose and a pretty, well-shaped mouth. The corners of his lips were constantly turned up in a smile and dimples appeared in both cheeks when he laughed. He had straight black hair which hung to his neck in a bob and showed signs of much care.
It was one of Mrs. Taylor’s deepest regrets that none of her sons had inherited her own soft, straight hair, which, to the same degree as her straight nose and fair complexion, was indicative of her white blood. She had been reared in the tradition that Negroes with straight hair and light complexions were superior to dark-complexioned Negroes with kinky hair. This conviction was supported by the fact that light-complexioned skin and straight hair did give Negroes a certain prestige within their race.
Of her three sons, Charles was her last hope in this respect. She longed for him to resemble her own father, after whom he had been named. From his birth she had taken great pains with his hair, nursing it along as if his life depended on it being straight. Every night she massaged his scalp with warm olive oil and gave his hair a hundred strokes with an imported brush; and several times each day she gently pinched the bridge of his nose to keep it from flattening out. At times Professor Taylor complained, “What are you trying to do, make a girl out of him?” But she ignored him and continued to do all within her power to cultivate her son’s white features.
Although she tried to love her sons equally, deep within her she loved Charles best.
As she stood behind the front screen door, watching the children play, she recalled what a seven-day sensation she had caused by engaging a white doctor at their births. It had incurred the animosity of all the Negro physicians and had provoked great consternation among the faculty. Her face hardened with a vague bitterness and she derived a fleeting sense of pleasure from the memory of her husband’s tremendous trepidation at the time. He was afraid of his own shadow, she thought.
The children were crouching down behind the rosebushes, peering through the picket fence. A dog trotted by on the cinder path outside.
“Bang! Bang!” screamed the children.
The dog jumped as if he had been stung and fled down the gulley. The children ran in wild pursuit as far as the yard permitted. She wondered absently what the dog represented.
Her gaze lingered on Charles. She’d wanted a girl when he was born, she recalled, thinking, he looked enough like a girl to have been one. It reminded her of what the doctor had laughingly remarked at his birth, “He is almost a girl, at that.”
Unconsciously she sniffed for the scent of flowers, a habit left over from her girlhood when she had tried to tell what flowers were blooming when she passed a garden at night. She had loved flowers and had addressed them as if they were human, scolding those that grew poorly and praising those that did well. There was a wonderful, earthy scent in the air, she noticed. It reminded her of the Easter Rambles held in her home town when she was a little girl. For a moment she reveled in the memory of the good times she had had during her girlhood. “Such good times,” she murmured, the words escaping from her lips. She smiled strangely; then the present invaded her consciousness again and the smile saddened and slowly vanished.
Sighing, she smoothed her hair. She wore it parted on the left and brushed loosely across her forehead, gathered in a chignon behind. In repose her features had a slightly drawn and bitter cast and her skin had the slightly pallid hue of one who has been ill for a long time. There were dark circles about her deep-set, gray-green eyes, and the lids drooped, giving her a look of weariness.
She was a tiny woman, but she carried herself with such implacable determination that her size was seldom noticed. She had always dressed attractively, even at home. The dark woolen dress she now wore had been ordered from Chicago but she had made the gingham apron. Her hands, clasped loosely across her waist, were slightly rough, and the knuckles were reddened and swollen from washing dishes. Her engagement ring with a solitary pearl and the plain gold wedding band which Professor Taylor had made in his shop from virgin metal gleamed brightly in the sunlight.
Absently, she watched the people pass along the street. A farmer drove by, his dilapidated wagon, pulled by a brace of mules, piled high with cordwood. She looked down across the front yards and picket fences of her neighbors. It was a pleasant street,
flanked by scattered elms, and the weeds had not yet had time to grow high in the gutters. Later, all the trees and flowers would be in bloom, she thought, and when the hedge about the college bloomed it was a lovely sight. Farther down the street was the state prison, bordered by an exquisitely beautiful flower garden tended by the prisoners, and sometimes the forbidding Black Maria passed before their door.
Mrs. Barnes drove by in her new carriage, the perfectly matched team of dappled gray mares kicking up dust from the graveled roadway. It was a pretty sight. Mrs. Taylor had heard they had a new carriage, but this was the first time she saw it. Dr. Barnes must be doing very well indeed, she reflected. In addition to being head of the college hospital he had a very good private practice. They lived in a large colonial-style house in the next block.
Mrs. Taylor was not on intimate terms with the Barneses—Dr. Barnes had never forgiven her for engaging a white doctor at the birth of her sons—and she prided herself on never having “set foot” in their house. But she had heard of their expensive furnishings and she had seen their blooded horses and luxurious carriages passing along the street. And she was no different from the other women of the community who envied them. But, unlike the others, she did not consider them her superior. Despite all their possessions and their great prestige, she felt herself to be their superior. And this was due entirely to the fact that Dr. Barnes was a dark-complexioned man and his wife only a “high yellow” with kinky hair. Mrs. Barnes could have no more than three-fourths white blood at best, and that was highly improbable, Mrs. Taylor had decided. She herself was only one thirty-second part Negro. And in her veins flowed some of the most aristocratic white blood in all the South. Mrs. Taylor thought of racial strains in terms of blood, and of this blood as flowing in her veins.
Mrs. Taylor had not always been so preoccupied with racial strains. Nor had her sense of being a superior person evoked such bitter disparagement. At first it had been protective, a shield for her wounded pride and outraged sensitivity. Quite often it had been constructive, enabling her to set her sights higher than most Negroes would have dared. It extended the limitations of her ambitions. And it also defended her from despondency and defeat. Whenever she felt the urge to give up, she reminded herself of her parents’ magnificent accomplishment, of how they had come out of slavery and made a home for themselves, and after great hardship had prospered and educated all seven of their children. She had inherited their determination and stamina and their credo—to want something better, to become educated, to be somebody worthwhile. And in remembering what they had done, she always remembered how they looked.
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