Quicksand
The title of the Larsen’s most famous and highly regarded novel is a symbol which can be applied to much of her other fiction as well. The imagery of quicksand is, of course, that a quagmire sucking you down below as though dragging you to the lowest level of existence by force and thereby denying your individuality. When one is sucked into the quicksand, they join everything else which has fallen victim and become inseparable. Thus, quicksand symbolizes the quagmire of conformity, convention and expectations which drains one of their personal identity.
“Passing”
Passing refers literally to the offspring of black/white biracial genetics who exhibits skin pigmentation lightly enough colored to “pass” as Caucasian among members of white society. By definition, however, it also means being equally accepted as a member of black society. So, symbolically, “passing” is invested more with what one isn’t than what one is. The connotative meaning of “passing” is associated with a sense of falsity and a lack of authenticity. If one is “passing” as an expert on ancient Sumerian texts, the logical conclusion is that person is not an expert on the subject. So if one is passing as white or passing as black, do they authentically belong to either?
Mis’ Poole’s Place
The sanctuary of the story with that title is the home of a black woman named Annie Poole, know as Mis’ Poole. She hides a fugitive from the justice wanted for murder from the representatives of white law enforcement when they arrive even though the person the fugitive has killed is her own son. The title of the story is symbolic because the sanctuary that Mis’ Poole provides even to a member of the black community who has enacted personal violence upon her family acts a metaphor for the collective societal protection African-Americans have been forced to provide for each other against the white establishment since slavery.
The Right Man
The title of the short story "The Wrong Man" is also situated as symbol, but in a different way from the sanctuary of Mis’ Poole’s home. The entire story is about a woman trying to maintain a deception from being discovered by one man by surreptitiously meeting with another man to convince him not to reveal the deception who winds up inadvertently revealing her deception to another man who mistook for the partner in duplicity. The title is an example of ironic symbolism. Literally, it seems to refer to the third man, but upon further examination it seems that all three qualify as the “wrong man” for this woman. If so, then is symbolism at work here seems to be one of absence, not presence: is there ever going to be a “right man.”
The Female Mulatto
Mulatto is a now-archaic term describing those of mixed black and white racial heritage. Most of Larsen’s protagonists meet this description and the genetic divisibility plays a role in their story. This division of so-called genetic purity is symbolically by Larsen to expand the dramatic tension in her stories so that the mythical genetic impurity is substantiated as a mythical identical impurity: belonging fully neither to black society or white society, what is the identity of the mulatto? Because identity is empowerment, adding the inherent societal subjugation of women to a lower status on top of the lack of racial equilibrium creates a multi-facted crisis of identity which drives the anxiety of those heroines.
