41 pages • 1 hour read
Silver Sparrow
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Part 1, Chapters 1-4Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 1: “Dana Lynn Yarboro”
Part 1, Chapter 1 Summary: “The Secret”
Atlanta native Dana Lynn Yarboro spends much of her conflicted “girlhood” tracking down her mother’s husband’s other wife, Laverne, and their daughter, Chaurisse. Laverne and Chaurisse are ignorant of James’s other family’s existence, but Dana and her mother, Gwen, are aware of them and comfort themselves with this knowledge.
Dana Lynn is five years old when she discovers that her family is considered abnormal. Asked to draw a portrait of her family in class, she includes her mother; her father, James; her father’s friend, Raleigh; and James’s other wife and daughter. When James sees the portrait, he tells Gwen to leave the room so he can talk to Dana Lynn alone. Gwen resists, telling him Dana Lynn is “just a child” (7); she is worried he’ll use “his belt” on Dana Lynn as he’s done before. However, she gives in and leaves Dana and James alone. James tells Dana Lynn she cannot talk about his other family in public; she is his “secret” and must keep his existence quiet. He then gives Dana Lynn some two-dollar bills, and the three of them eat dinner together.
Soon after, Dana Lynn theorizes that the reason she is a secret is because of her missing teeth. She tries to fix this imperfection by putting cardboard in between her teeth, thinking that, like her mother, she must start an elaborate beauty routine. Her mother discovers Dana Lynn’s efforts and insists Dana Lynn doesn’t need any adjustments to be beautiful. Dana Lynn explains that she wants to be as beautiful as James’s other daughter, whose name she refuses to say out loud. When Gwen says the name “Chaurisse,” Dana Lynn tells her to stop as she is “afraid” of the name’s power. Gwen tries to assure Dana Lynn that Chaurisse is “a little girl, just like you,” but Dana Lynn isn’t convinced (13). Gwen then prods Dana Lynn to find out what James said in private after seeing her family portrait. Dana Lynn divulges that James said she was a secret, causing Gwen to hug Dana Lynn and express her frustration with James.
Following this incident, Gwen takes Dana Lynn to see Chaurisse as Chaurisse is leaving school. Dana Lynn realizes that Chaurisse is “utterly ordinary” (14). Gwen ends the visit by assuring Dana Lynn that James loves both daughters equally.
Part 1, Chapter 2 Summary: “A Sort of Creeping Love”
Dana Lynn defines James and Gwen’s love as gradual rather than sudden. Her mother insists their love is bigger than “the laws of the state of Georgia” (16).
When she meets James, Gwen has already led a fraught life, abandoned by her mother as a baby and by her father as an adult. Before James, Gwen married her high-school sweetheart, only to leave him in a matter of months, thus losing her relationships with both her husband and her father. The newly divorced Gwen is working as “the very first colored woman” gift wrapper at Davison’s when James walks in wanting to purchase a knife for his wife (18). Gwen senses unhappiness. She feels “shame” about her lack of activism on behalf of the African American population, and she is feeling this particularly acutely after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. (18). In this “remorseful” mindset, she cannot help but giggle at James purchasing a knife for his wife (18).
James stumbles out of line, “embarrassed,” to search for another gift (20). A white woman tries to joke with Gwen about men’s odd behavior, but Gwen can’t bring herself to laugh with a white woman at his expense. At closing time, James approaches Gwen again but this time with a gift for her as well as one for his wife. Gwen accepts the gift of perfume, and months later, when he shows up again, she accepts his offer for coffee. He picks her up in the limo he drives for work, and though the date starts off awkwardly, he tries to make her feel comfortable, resulting in what soon becomes a blossoming romantic relationship.
Not long after, Gwen finds herself in love with and impregnated by James.
Part 1, Chapter 3 Summary: “Notes on Precocity”
Dana Lynn describes James as mostly agreeable as well as mostly absent. He always wears his chauffeur uniform because he is proud of being an African American man who owns his own business. His stutter gets worse when he feels emotional, causing him to advise her against intense emotion. She also reflects on how her parents never have passionate, emotional fights, only “disagreements” that always center around Dana Lynn. In one fight, Gwen demanded that James help fund extracurricular science classes for Dana Lynn since Chaurisse was already enrolled and she wanted the same “opportunity” for Dana Lynn. James only agreed to do so, however, when Gwen agreed to send Dana Lynn to a program separate from Chaurisse. This same scenario almost repeated itself when Dana Lynn was choosing a high school: Had Chaurisse chosen the same science-based school Dana Lynn had, Dana Lynn would have been forced to find another academy in order to protect her father’s affair.
Dana Lynn goes on to talk about her early struggles with romantic love. She got in trouble for kissing too many boys and felt all of them “disappointed” her, including the “nerdy” Perry Hammonds.
In her recollection, she finds Perry lusting after a teacher and, feeling vengeful, she ruins his science project, eliminating him from the class’s competition and carving out a clear path to first place. Although she wins the class competition, she loses the city-wide one—a loss one of the woman judges blames on the way Dana Lynn “present[s]” herself” (43).
As Dana Lynn is walking around the science competition, she sees Chaurisse crying and wearing the same rabbit skin jacket Dana Lynn has on. Dana Lynn feels hurt knowing that James lied to her; he told her he won it for her in a card game, but she now realizes he must have bought both of them in a store. While she is gawking at Chaurisse, Chaurisse strikes up a conversation with her, telling her she forgot part of her project at home. Laverne then shows up with the missing pieces, leaving Dana Lynn to witness firsthand her father’s “main” wife (45). She finds Laverne more maternal but less beautiful than her own mother. Laverne comments on the girls’ matching jackets, and Dana Lynn announces that her father won hers playing cards. This startles Laverne, but she quickly brushes it off and leaves.
Part 1, Chapter 4 Summary: “Grand Gesture”
Gwen’s first marriage was to the undertaker’s son, Clarence. He wanted to have sex with her, but she insisted they get engaged first. He mulled it over and finally conceded by saying, “[W]e can get engaged. We’re engaged right now. Okay?” (51).
When it comes time to tell James she is pregnant, Gwen is afraid. She writes it down on “scrap” and hands it to him. He reads it and begins stuttering, but he finally decides he is happy because he assumes it will be a boy, and Laverne has not been able to give him a baby in years, their first child having died in childbirth. Seeing his joy, Gwen proposes they get married. James responds that he will not divorce Laverne. Gwen prods him further, saying they can cross state lines and marry in Alabama. After this discussion, he drives back to Laverne and leaves Gwen pregnant and lonely.
Willie Mae, Gwen’s next-door neighbor in her boardinghouse, offers to help her as much as she can, but Gwen is about to lose everything once it becomes physically apparent that she is pregnant. She tries to appeal to her father, but he refuses her. James eventually shows up again, this time with his friend, Raleigh, in tow. James and Raleigh give her a check, and Raleigh agrees to sign Dana Lynn’s birth certificate. Gwen and James then get married in Alabama as she suggested.
Part 1, Chapters 1-4 Analysis
Resentment towards James Witherspoon is brewing in the first section of this novel. James wants the best of both worlds and, in the process of trying to get them, is destroying them. This is clear from early on, when James decides to give both his wife and Gwen a gift.
Dana Lynn’s resentment begins subtly, but it is full-fledged by the close of this section. James’s labeling her a “secret” lays the foundation for this resentment, as the distinction leaves her feeling dirty and ashamed. Additionally, James’s beating her with his belt causes Dana Lynn to see him as someone to rebel against rather than someone to respect. James’s guilt is also the reason Dana Lynn can’t participate in many activities she is qualified for. James’s preservation of his dreams over hers shows her how little he values her. Dana Lynn’s resentment peaks when she finds out James lied about the origins of the jacket he bought her. This falsehood makes Dana Lynn feel she will never be anything but an extra in James’s life, pushing her to the point of seeking revenge.
Gwen’s resentment of James begins to grow alongside the growth of her baby. Just after her announcement, he makes it clear that she will always be second place. She is forced to beg him to marry her, beg her father for a place to stay, and beg Willie Mae for financial and emotional help. While James does eventually aid her, she is still for the most part a single mother, in spirit if not in name. Gwen grows increasingly infuriated with James the older Dana Lynn gets and the more he gives preference to Chaurisse over Dana Lynn. All these paths to resentment point towards a future for James marked by instability.
In the background of the central emotional drama is a further tension governed by respectability politics. As African Americans, Gwen and James feel intense pressure to present themselves as upstanding individuals. Gwen is willing to have a man she has barely met sign Dana Lynn’s birth certificate to avoid the stigma attached to a bastard child. She marries a man who has already professed his love for someone else in order to remain respectable on paper. At work, Gwen is hyper aware of her role as the first African American gift wrapper and knows that she must appear in equal parts efficient and invisible to maintain this post. Likewise, James knows he will lose business if people find out he is a bigamist and that, most likely, this loss will spread to other African American entrepreneurs. The determination to be appear respectable creates added strain on James and Gwen’s already resentment-filled relationship.
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