How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
Without his being aware the street had begun to slope and before he knew it he was in Freedman Town, surrounded by the summer smell and the summer voices of invisible negroes. They seemed to enclose him like bodiless voices murmuring, talking, laughing, in a language not his. As from the bottom of a thick black pit he saw himself enclosed by cabinshapes, vague, kerosenelit, so that the street lamps themselves seemed to be further spaced, as if the black life, the black breathing had compounded the substance of breath so that not only voices but moving bodies and light itself must become fluid and accrete slowly from particle to particle… (5.22)
Christmas finds himself becoming overwhelmed by black people, even though there aren't any around. These phantom black people seem to haunt him wherever he goes, reminding him of the possibility of his black ancestry, but also seeming to haunt the white South as well.
Quote #5
On a lighted veranda four people sat about a card table, the white faces intent and sharp in the low light, the bare arms of the women glaring smooth and white above the trivial cards. 'That's all I wanted,' he thought. "That don't seem like a whole lot to ask." (5.24)
This is the first time we see Christmas expressing a desire – however, it's unclear what that desire is. Does he simply want to be able to have fun? Or does he want to be white, without question?
Quote #6
Nevertheless his blood began again, talking and talking. He walked fast, in time to it; he seemed to be aware that the group were negroes before he could have even seen or heard them at all, before they even came in sight vaguely against the defunctive dust. (5.26)
Christmas constantly experiences his black blood "talking" to him – whenever he passes as white, he feels like he's betraying the black blood that supposedly runs through his veins as well.