The Vanishing Half: A Novel

A good deal of emphasis is placed on skin tone throughout the book. The difference between White and Black is important, but so are the nuanced shades of black and their various meanings. Much of the novel’s racial intolerance is exhibited by the inhabitants of Mallard. Because they are so light-skinned, they look down on Black people with darker complexions. Part of Adele’s animosity toward Early stems from his dark complexion. She equates his skin tone with poverty, indigence, and low social status. She also initially dislikes Jude because of her black skin. The girl’s skin tone indirectly suggests a Black father whom Adele would classify negatively in the same category as Early.

Jude is harassed by her schoolmates in Mallard because she is the only dark-skinned child in town. One of the reasons she flees to California is to escape the misery inflicted on her by the villagers. She has already internalized a sense of unworthiness because she views her own skin color as unacceptable. As a child, Jude recalls her father taking precisely the opposite view of skin tone. Sam beats Desiree because her light skin is a tacit reproach of his own darkness. He cautions Jude, “‘You gotta watch your mama […] She still like those folks.’ ‘What folks?’ […] ‘The folks she come from,’ he said. ‘Your mama still got some of that in her. She still think she better than us’” (88). Finally, despite Stella’s Caucasian complexion, she lives in mortal terror of being exposed by another Black person. In her own mind, she can never be White enough to feel completely safe.