The Ways of White Folks

“The Studevants thought they owned her, and they were perfectly right: they did. There was something about the teeth in the trap of economic circumstance that kept her in their power practically all her life—in the Studevant kitchen, cooking; in the Studevant parlor, sweeping; in the Studevant backyard, hanging clothes.” 

Throughout “Cora Unashamed,” Cora Jenkins grapples with the positives and negatives of working for the Studevant family. She considers leaving, but the Studevants’ powerful economic power, and the lack of jobs in Melton, trap Cora into staying. Her struggle in Story 1 provides the building blocks for Hughes’s comments on class and the power the rich have over the poor in the United States. 

“She approached the coffin and held out her brown hands over the white girl’s body. Her face moved in agitation. People sat stone-still and there was a long pause. Suddenly she screamed. ‘They killed you! And for nothin’…They killed your child…They took you away from here in the springtime of your life, and now you’se gone, gone, gone!’” 

Cora’s outburst releases the narrative tension built throughout the story. Her cries are cinematic, providing the reader with a dramatic conclusion. She has pieced together Jessie’s illness and death—the truth that the rest of the Studevants try to hide—demonstrating her intellect and agency. Cora also refuses to remain silent regarding the cause of Jessie’s death, showing her strong moral center; she would rather speak the truth, even if it means losing her job. 

“They saw no use in helping a race that was already too charming and naive and lovely for words. Leave them unspoiled and just enjoy them, Michael and Anne felt. So they went in for the Art of Negroes—the dancing that had such jungle life about it, the songs that were so simple and fervent, the poetry that was so direct, so real. They never tried to influence that art, they only bought it and raved over it, and copied it. For they were artists, too.” 

Michael and Anne see themselves as progressive and liberal-minded, but their outlook is nevertheless flawed. They don’t wish ill will on Black people. Instead, they fetishize them, taking in parts of their culture like a hobby, and still fail to see them as equal human beings. Despite their supposedly kind outlook, Michael and Anne admit they don’t see the use in providing meaningful help to the Black people in their surrounding community. 

“Luther and Mattie together were a pair. They quite frankly lived with one another now. Well, let that go. Anne and Michael prided themselves on being different; artists, you know, and liberal-minded people—maybe a little scatter-brained, but then (secretly, they felt) that came from genius. They were not ordinary people, bothering about the liberties of others. Certainly, the last thing they would do would be to interfere with the delightful simplicity of Negroes.” 

As the story progresses, Michael and Anne continue to view Black people as simple. Their failure to grapple with their own biases sets them up for failure, culminating at the end of the story when Luther and Mattie leave before Anne can finish her painting. The couple’s inflated egos are likewise displayed when they choose to think of their disorganization as “genius,” further showing them as flawed characters. 

“Roy picked up his bags, since there were no porters, and carried them toward a rusty old Ford that seemed to be a taxi. He felt dizzy and weak. The smoke and dust of travel had made him cough a lot. The eyes of the white men about the station were not kind. He heard some one mutter, ‘N*****.’ His skin burned. For the first time in half a dozen years he felt his color. He was home.” 

Hughes employs sensory details to paint Roy’s return to the US with unpleasantness and tension. Physically, Roy feels dizzy and frail, and the surrounding smoke makes him cough. His home literally pains him. The social environment brings more tension, with White men muttering racist slurs at him. With these details, Hughes establishes home as an unkind place for Roy. 

“This is Hopkinsville, Missouri.…Look at all those brown girls back there in the crowd of Negroes, leaning toward me and the music. First time most of them ever saw a man in evening clothes, black or white. First time most of them ever heard the Meditation from Thaïs. First time they ever had one of their own race come home from abroad playing a violin. See them looking proud at me and music over the heads of the white folks in the first rows, over the head of the white woman in the cheap coat and red hat who knows what music’s all about…” 

Roy’s performance puts his talent and hard work on display, revealing the benefits of being treated and educated as an equal in Europe. Hughes shows the power of music, a motif addressed regularly throughout the collection, when Roy’s music soars over the White audience sitting in the front to reach the Black audience in the back. Class and poverty are addressed as well. This time, Hughes describes all of Hopkinsville as underdeveloped. Even many of the White folks haven’t seen a man in evening clothes. 

“The movies had just let out and the crowd, passing by and seeing, objected to a Negro talking to a white woman—insulting a White Woman—attacking a WHITE woman—RAPING A WHITE WOMAN. They saw Roy remove his gloves and bow. When Miss Reese screamed after Roy had been struck, they were sure he had been making love to her. And before the story got beyond the rim of the crowd, Roy had been trying to rape her, right there on the main street in front of the brightly-lighted windows of the drug store. Yes, he did, too! Yes, sir!” 

In this passage, the threat of violence quickly ramps up. With each sentence, the accusations of the crowd intensify. Talking becomes insulting, and attacking becomes rape, even though Roy never did anything he was accused of. Hughes shows how quickly a racist mindset can steer into violent action. Even when there is no justification, a reason can be fabricated, then spread. 

“The little Negro whose name was Roy Williams began to choke on the blood in his mouth. And the roar of their voices and the scuff of their feet were split by the moonlight into a thousand notes like a Beethoven sonata. And when the white folks left his brown body, stark naked, strung from a tree at the edge of town, it hung there all night, like a violin for the wind to play.” 

Hughes utilizes the motif of music, established throughout “Home,” to heighten the sensory details and drama of the final scene. The mob kills Roy Williams, but his art—his music—gives him respite. Faced with death, he hears music, allowing him at least some escape. Roy’s body becomes an instrument for the earth to play.

“Since I’ve begun to pass for white, nobody has ever doubted that I am a white man. Where I work, the boss is a Southerner and is always cussing out Negroes in my presence, not dreaming I’m one. It is to laugh!” 

“Passing” shows the complex benefits and pitfalls of a half-Black person passing for White, a theme Hughes goes on to address regularly throughout the collection. Here, Jack’s ability to pass for White is laced with irony and black humor. His boss is outwardly prejudice yet has no idea one of his employees is Black. 

“I wonder what she would have said if I’d told her I was colored, or half-colored—that my old man was white, but you weren’t? But I guess I won’t go into that. Since I’ve made up my mind to live in the white world, and have found my place in it (a good place), why think about race any more? I’m glad I don’t have to, I know that much.”

The complexities of passing unfold in this story. Jack feels his life is better because he can pass for White, and he chooses to embrace it, but it comes at a price. He makes a conscious choice not to disclose his family history. He denies a part of himself, showing his idyllic life comes at a price: his own history. 

“The boss said, ‘This is no ordinary boy, Lucille. True, he’s my servant, but I’ve got him in Columbia studying to be a dentist, and he’s just as white inside as he is black. Treat him right, or I’ll see why.’ And it wasn’t long before this Lucille dame was gone, and he had a little Irish girl with blue eyes he treated mean as hell.” 

Hughes crafts Mr. Lloyd as a cruel but complex character, utilizing dialogue and backstory to do so. Mr. Lloyd helps send the main character to school but still views being White as being better than being Black. Mr. Lloyd demands the women he sees treat the narrator well, while also being cruel to those very women. The juxtapositions make Mr. Lloyd more complex and not a one-dimensional brute. 

“‘A white bastard!’ she said. ‘Just because they pay you, they always think they own you. No white man’s gonna own me. I laugh with ’em and they think I like ’em. Hell, I’m from Arkansas where the crackers lynch n*****s in the streets. How could I like ’em?’” 

Pauline’s words further develop Hughes’s comments on class and racism. Pauline is critical of feeling owned by White people, suggesting Hughes doesn’t feel money should lead to a sense of ownership or entitlement over another human life. The prolonged impact of hatred and racism likewise comes through Pauline’s words. She can’t forgive White people for the lynchings she saw in her home state.

“‘Primitive man never sits in chairs. Look at the Indians! Look at the Negroes! They know how to move from the feet up, from the head down. Their centers live. They walk, they stand, they dance to their drum beats, their earth rhythms. They squat, they kneel, they lie—but they never, in their natural states, never sit in chairs. They do not mood and brood. No! They live through motion, through movement, through music, through joy!” 

Through dialogue, Eugene Lesche proves himself to be charismatic and convincing. He critiques modern societal norms: too much sitting in chairs, not enough joy. To further captivate his audience, Lesche fetishizes and commodifies cultures foreign to the audience. If the audience members want to achieve joy, they should behave more like Indian people and Black people, and Lesche will show them the way—at a price, of course. 

“Others of the Colony of Joy had been Scientists in their youth. Others had wandered, disappointed, the ways of spiritualism, never finding soul-mates; still others had gazed solemnly into crystals, but had seen nothing but darkness; now, they had come to Joy!” 

This passage suggests that some of life’s greatest challenges are finding purpose and satisfaction. The people who find their way to Lesche’s Colony of Joy have been looking for personal and spiritual fulfilment. The quest for purpose can be long, arduous, and, as Lesche demonstrates, exploited by those looking to make money off other’s needs. 

“Oceola hated most artists, too, and the word art in French or English. If you wanted to play the piano or paint pictures or write books, go ahead! But why talk so much about it? Montparnasse was worse in that respect than the Village. And as for the cultured Negroes who were always saying art would break down color lines, art could save the race and prevent lynchings! ‘Bunk!’ said Oceola. ‘My ma and pa were both artists when it came to making music, and the white folks ran them out of town for being dressed up in Alabama. And look at the Jews! Every other artist in the world’s a Jew, and still folks hate them.’”

Throughout The Ways of White Folks, art and music are places of refuge from hate and oppression. Hughes avoids oversimplifying this message by offering counter arguments. In “The Blues I’m Playing,” Oceola points out the shortcomings of art. Art isn’t enough to stop hate, especially when the artists themselves still deal with hate and prejudice. 

“I hope not, ’cause if she stops at one of them big hotels. I won’t have you going to the back door to see her. That’s one thing I hate about the South—where there’re white people, you have to go to the back door.” 

With minimal dialogue, Hughes builds the world of “The Blues I’m Playing.” Pete doesn’t fall into lengthy exposition. Instead, he provides a short but powerful detail about the treatment he faces in the South. With these words, the reader further understands the world Pete and Oceola live in.

“There was no other way to consider the little colored boy whom they were raising as their own, their very own, except as a Christian duty. After all, they were white. It was no easy thing to raise a white child, even when it belonged to one, whereas this child was black, and had belonged to their servants, Amanda and Arnold.” 

The Pembertons appear to be well-intentioned when they choose to raise Amanda and Arnold’s child after they die prematurely. However, as seen in other stories, such as “Slave on the Block,” the Pembertons' kindness is laced with problematic thinking. They decide to raise the child because of their Christian duty, motivated by an obligation rather than an internal desire to do the right thing. Although they take in Arnie as a baby, they feel they will always see him as not their own because of the color of his skin. 

“At the Martinique ball he’d met dozens of nice girls: white girls and brown girls, and yellow girls, artists and students and dancers and models and tourists. Harry knew everybody. And everybody was gay and friendly. Paris and music and cocktails made you forget what color people were—and what color you were yourself. Here it didn’t matter—color.” 

The inclusiveness of Paris creates a startling contrast to the racism and segregation depicted in the South of the United States. Arnie experiences a place filled with people from all over the world and doesn’t feel like the color of his skin matters. While the racism in the South is never irradicated in the collection, Hughes shows that equality is achievable.

“‘Besides,’ Millberry said to himself, ‘the ways of white folks, I mean some white folks, is too much for me. I reckon they must be a few good ones, but most of ’em aint good—leastwise they don’t treat me good. And lawd knows, I ain’t never done nothin’ to ’em, nothing’ a-tall.’” 

Berry’s complete train of thought, which is excerpted for the epigraph at the opening of the collection, creates a somber tone for Berry’s story. He hasn’t done anything wrong, but he faces unfair treatment, nevertheless. Berry refuses to resort to oversimplified hatred. He reasons not all White people are cruel. Still, most of his interactions with White people have been negative experiences for him, showing that progress still needs to be made.

“Why is it that lots of white people always grin when they see a Negro child? Santa Claus grinned. Everybody else grinned, too, looking at little black Joe—who had no business in the lobby of a white theatre. Then Santa Claus stooped down and slyly picked up one of his lucky number rattles, a great big loud tin-pan rattle such as they use in cabarets. And he shook it fiercely right at Joe. That was funny. The white people laughed, kids and all. But little Joe didn’t laugh. He was scared. To the shaking of the big rattle, he turned and fled out of the warm lobby of the theatre, out into the street where the snow was and the people. Frightened by laughter, he had begun to cry. He went looking for his mama. In his heart he never thought Santa Claus shook great rattles at children like that—and then laughed.” 

Hughes uses the perspective of a child to show the dramatic impact segregation can have. Joe, being Black in the South, has never been inside a White theater. Their Santa Claus theatrics are foreign to him and end up scaring him. Joe’s lack of exposure, and his lack of being invited in, results in fear, showing another negative aspect of segregation. 

“‘He’s too damn much like me,’ the Colonel thought. ‘Quick as hell. Cora’s been telling me he’s leading his class at the Institute, and a football captain.… H-m-m-m, so they waste their time playing football at these darkie colleges.… Well, anyway, he must be a smart darkie. Got my blood in him.’”

Hughes makes the villain of “Father and Son” complex rather than one-note. The Colonel recognizes Bert’s impressive collegiate accomplishments and likewise sees himself in his son, but each complement is laced with negativity and criticism. The Colonel admires Bert’s drive, but he also hates Bert, constantly reminded that he has a biracial son so much like himself. 

“Coralee Lewis, sitting washing plums, had been Colonel Norwood’s mistress for thirty years. She had lived in the Big House, supervised his life, given him children, and loved him. In his turn, he felt something very like love for her. Now, in his sixties, without Cora he would have been lost, but of course he did not realize that—consciously.” 

The characters of “Father and Son” are complex, human, and imperfect. Despite the Colonel’s shortcomings, Coralee finds a way to love him. She embodies forgiveness and the possibility of a brighter future. Coralee’s command over the Colonel’s life also shows Coralee to be intelligent and resourceful, perhaps even more so than the Colonel. While Colonel Norwood doesn’t love as purely as Coralee, he isn’t filled with hate. He still loves Coralee in a way his flawed character is capable of. 

“Now down and pray in fear and trembling, go way back in the dark afraid; or work harder and harder; or stumble and learn; or raise up your fist and strike—but once the idea comes into your head you’ll never be the same again. Oh, test tube of life! Crucible of the South, find the right powder and you’ll never be the same again—the cotton will blaze and the cabins will burn and the chains will be broken and men, all of a sudden, will shake hands, black men and white men, like steel meeting steel!” 

Hughes enhances the prose of this passage with vivid and poetic lines. Bert is fed up with the way he’s treated, and his anguish has peaked. Hughes expresses that rage with images of the South burning. Exclamation points further ramp up the intensity of the passage, in addition to the simile of Black men and White men slamming together like steel. Here, Hughes suggests a new future is possible, but it may require the destruction of the old ways.