the color of water essay

The book, The Color of Water is written by James McBride. It is about a Jewish, white woman named Ruth who married a black man and had many children. Their child James didn’t understand why his mother was white and he was black. She tells him later in the book why they were the colors they were. Later in life James becomes the author of many famous books like the book Miracle at St. Anna.

Ruth refuses to tell her children about her past, because she wants them to believe that everyone is equal and fears they will think differently if they hear about her past. She did not want them to learn how hurtful racism could be. Ruth begins telling her son that she is dead, because her family has told her she was dead in their eyes because she went against their heritage by marrying a black man. Her family basically disowned her because she did not marry a Jewish man.

I believe Ruth’s contradictions confused her children when they were younger, but I believe as they grew into adults they better understood the hurtful side of racism and what their mother dealt with. They could appreciate their mother’s experiences since she dealt with both racism and religious prejudice. Even though she was white, her own family had been evil to her and though she thought blacks could be trusted more, she knew they may not have the same advantages as whites. Ruth’s name changes three times in the book first it is Rachul Dwajra Zylska which was her Hebrew name then her name became Rachel Deborah Shilsky which was her second name, then her name became Ruth McBride Jordan which was her married name.

Her style of parenting was better because she let her kids have more freedom than her they and had let his kids have like not allowing her to marry the person that she loved but trying to make her love someone that he wanted her to love. So she had to leave her family do marry the man she wanted to marry and they basically disowned her because she married this man because he was a black man and they wanted her to marry somebody of the Jewish heritage.

McBride’s recounting of his mother’s life helped him answer questions about race and identity that had troubled him his whole life because he realized how hard his mother’s life really was after he looked back at all the things she did. The title The Color of Water is significant because shows that it doesn’t matter what color you are and people are always asking what color is God and in this book she gives the view that God is neither black nor white but he is the color of water. I believe that this is the perfect analogy. McBride perceives the historical events as continuing battles of race and his family was ones of the families that had to go through the racial battle. I would recommend this book to someone that is highly interested in the racism debate but I myself did not enjoy this book because it was very hard to get into the book and be excited to read the next chapter. To me the book did not have any exciting parts and I just couldn’t get into it


Forrest H