The Decaying South in "Bloodline"

River Lake Plantation 1938 

This past weekend, I read Gaines's "Bloodline" (1968) alongside Langston Hughes's Mulatto: A Tragedy of the Deep South (1935). Reading these two pieces together, one can see many thematic similarities even though they are ostensibly different genres and appear about thirty three years apart. I do not have time to touch on every similarity between each text. Instead, I just want to focus on one essential aspect that appears in each text, namely the appearance of the central white characters in each story. Both texts center around the return of a "mulatto" character who comes back to the plantation, either to move people to action as in "Bloodline" or to seek what is rightfully his and recognition from his father as in Mulatto.

Frank Laurent owns the plantation in Gaines's "Bloodline," a story that centers of the return of Copper Laurent to the quarters. Frank fears that Copper, who is his nephew from a relationship that Walter Laurent had with Copper's mother, has come back to rile up the inhabitants of the quarter and to start trouble. One must keep in mind that the story appeared in 1968, during the Civil Rights Era, and throughout Gaines's work, whites fear demonstrations occurring on their land and African Americans continually comment that the movement has not reached them yet. Typically, a student who has left the quarters and returns tells the inhabitants about the movement taking place. (Think of Jimmy Aaron in The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman.) Felix, the narrator of "Bloodline," even says, "They doing that [demonstrating] everywhere else, 'Mailia. Everywhere else but here" (161).

Over the years, Frank's grip on the plantation fades, representing the changing times that have made their way  into the Deep South. Felix describes "the last of the old Laurents" as feeble and struggling "to look hard" when those around him knew "that hardness had gone" (164, 165). The people who still live on the plantation and work in the big house notice Frank's decline and challenge his "rules" in small ways. For example, whenever Frank tells Little Boy and Joby to go down to the quarters and retrieve Copper, Little Boy looks in the corner to Miss Amalia and asks her if it she is all right with him forcefully bringing her nephew up to the big house to see Frank. The exchange is worth quoting at length:

"You're asking her if it's all right when I told you to do something?" Frank asked him.
"I wouldn't want to do nothing she might not--" Little Boy stopped again before he finished.
"Do like Mr. Frank say," 'Malia said, with her head down.
"Just a minute," Frank said. "Who the hell's running this place, me or Amalia?"
"I guess you, Mr. Frank," Little Boy said.
"You guess, nigger?" Frank said. "You guess?"
Little Bot lowered his head, but Frank kept on looking at him. Then all of a sudden his face changed. Like only now he re'lized maybe he wasn't running the place. Maybe somebody else was running it after all. Or, maybe nobody was running it. Maybe it was just running down." (emphasis in original 173-174)

These types of exchanges also occur between Frank and Felix. One could assume that Little Boy's deference to Miss Amalia does not occur because of Copper's appearance on the plantation; instead, he asks her blessing because he respects her and knows that the man he is about to confront is her nephew.

 Little Boy and Jorby fail to bring Copper back to the big house. In fact, Copper beats them up and ties them together with a chain. Furious, Frank tells Felix to gather up another group of men to go fetch Copper. Like Little Boy and Jorby, the group of six men fail to get Copper to return to the house. Ultimately, Frank must descend to leaving the big house in order to meet Copper; he rides out the quarters and speaks with Copper on the porch of Amalia's house. When he arrives, Felix describes Frank's movements as he extricates himself from the automobile: "The tall, sick, white man went in the yard with his head high. . . Frank stood before Copper, leaning on the cane and breathing hard" (203). Even though Frank's power deteriorates, he remains adamant that he will maintain control until he dies. He approaches the house "with his head high" and at the end of the story he convinces Copper to leave the plantation. However, Copper still reminds Frank that his time has come to an end. Copper looks down at a seated Frank, not on an equal level or up at him, and he informs him, "Your days are over, Uncle" (217). Frank knows that his way of life has come to an end, and he even mentions this at various points throughout the story. Felix's descriptions of Frank, and Frank's comments, illuminate the changing times taking place on the plantation in much the same way that the description of Colonel Thomas Norwood does in Hughes's Mulatto.      

On Thursday, I talk about Hughes's play and how it relates to "Bloodline," specifically in regards to the changing South and to the decaying plantation traditions. Until then, what are your thought's on Gaines's "Bloodline"? What other themes do you see in the story?

Gaines, Ernest J. "Bloodline." Bloodline. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1976. 159-217. Print.