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Caucasia
Denzy Senna. Riverhead Books: 1999 (paperback). ISBN: 1573227161. 413 pages.
Guide not available
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If your mother is white, and your father is black, then who are you? James McBride
examined this question in his memoir The Color of Water, but for Birdie, the protagonist of Senna's novel, the
question is complicated by the fact that she looks white, while her beloved sister Cole looks black. Birdie struggles to
be accepted as a legitimate sister in the black community and feels like an unwilling spy in her encounters with whites.
When her politically militant mother commits what may or may not be a dangerous terrorist act, Birdie's family splits up
and she must go into hiding with her mother, losing her name, her home, and all claims to her black identity. Senna's
portrayal of Birdie's desperate efforts to straddle the racial fence and to stay true to whatever it is that comprises
her real nature is superb. This book is a fresh and necessary reminder that so much of who we are, who people think we
are, and who we think we should be is dictated by the categories we continue to protect. Birdie's situation illustrates
the human need to classify, while simultaneously protesting the ludicrously inadequate nature of these classifications.
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