I'm A Mary

...and I don't know how to feel about it.

On the one hand, Marys are good! Better than Mr. Daltons, or especially Brittens or Buckleys, right? (That is, better to be a radical who wants equality than to 1) give to the black community nominally and/or hypocritically or 2) actively be racist, discriminatory, and against black "progress" (Invisible Man has made me rethink the meaning of that word))

However, being a Mary, at least to a Bigger, is clearly not the safest course of action. Her willingness to sit in the front seat as an equal, or ask him about his life, or let him carry her like a drunken, potentially incriminating ragdoll, all have the opposite of their intended effect. Mary makes Bigger uncomfortable in a deep sense, and her defiance of societal norms is not refreshing to him but a jarring what the hell are you doing sort of social limbo. It's that exact unidentifiable hate that makes Bigger come to terms a little easier with her death, and also go from "accidental death" to "murder" as fast as he does.

Some of my Mary-like impulses (from, among other things, growing up a privileged, white liberal woman in a moderately wealthy family) made me frustrated with Bigger as a character. "He can't see the good in anybody!" I wrote furiously in my notes. "I hate that about him!" The naturalist point of the novel is that I shouldn't hate Bigger for that-- I should hate the circumstances that brought that hate about: the institutionalized racism in housing, jobs, movies, and all the other things Bigger has been affected and afflicted by his whole life. Mary (and Marys like her) are just cut off from those things and just don't see them. As Bigger says, they're "blind."

I have a complicated relationship with Mary. I believe that in general, she's a good person. I imagine she gets along quite well with white people speaking the way she does, and with certain African-Americans willing to entertain her nonsense long enough to see that she really is trying to be nice. She's sort of like Effie Trinket, if you've ever read The Hunger Games. (That's the prissy, airheaded representative from the rich, dominating Capitol whose job is to lead the two main characters to a televised battle to the death.) She's insufferable at first, but given enough time to understand the gravity of the situation that she's never had to face, she becomes a little more sympathetic a few books into the series.

The obvious next step is thinking about how not to be a Mary, if/since being a Mary is that undesirable. (There's a perpetuation here that Leslie informed me of: In my worry to not be a Mary I'm becoming...more of a Mary. Sigh.) Since I've never dealt with Marys as a black person, I might look at the analogy of Effie. In the Hunger Games, there's really no good way you'd want anyone to treat you when they're leading you to the slaughter. Sympathy seems forced and stark optimism is just repulsive. Ignorance would be alienating, but at least you would know what to do with her.

I really have no good way to resolve this question. Partly it's not my question to answer, and partly everyone likes to be treated differently. Maybe someone would enjoy being around Mary. Maybe the narrator from Invisible Man (as he is in the first few chapters) might admire her. It's the difference between the Booker T Washingtons and the DuBoises of the world, the MLKS and the Malcolm X's: Is a white person's respect worth having? Is collaboration the key, or separatism?

I would love to be refuted in the comments. This is an issue I am far from authoritative on, and I would hate to be a Mary.