The Harlem Renaissance was an African American literature movement set during the 1920s and early 1930s. ‘’ Renaissance’’ which means rebirth, was set in Harlem, an area in New York City which was created to celebrate African American literature and art. There were a lot of famous authors, poets, and editors during the Harlem renaissance including Nella Larsen a well known novelist of two books, Quicksand and Passing. To commence, Nella Larsen was born in Chicago, Illinois, on April 13 1891, Larsen was the daughter of a Danish mother and West Indian father. Her father died when she was only two years old, after, her mother married a Danish man, later it was revealed that she had a half-sister who she attended a private school in Chicago with.…show more content… Throughout, the novel Helga cannot accept herself being just one race, later she moves to Chicago due to racial politics in her school. While living in Chicago with her white uncle, she finds that his new wife dislikes her diverse race, she moves out with no money and all alone. Later she finds a job with a wealthy woman named Mrs. Hayes-Rore, after she moves to New York where she stays with her friend Anne Grey who was a wealthy popular woman from Harlem. Helga gets tired of her life in New York and moves to Denmark, she gets treated with more respect while she’s there but realizes that she misses New York, sad and lonely she starts going to church where she meets Reverend Pleasant Green, they get married and move to Alabama where she gets sick after giving birth to her fourth child. She realizes that she hates her husband and the life of poverty she is in, the book ends with her giving birth to her fifth child and that she is condemned to poverty and unhappiness. Larsen’s second novel Passing was published on April 26 1929, is about two women form Chicago who had been friends since
