the house you pass on the way written by jacqueline woodson

Woodson, Jacqueline. The House You Pass on the Way. New York: Delacorte Press, 1997. ISBN: 9780142417065

Plot Summary:
     Staggerlee is a teen-aged girl struggling with the search of her own identity. At the age of nine, she changed her name from Evangeline to Staggerlee in hopes of alleviating this struggle; however, this name change was only the first step to her attempt to find herself. Staggerlee's mother is white and her father is black, so living among a black community Staggerlee struggles to fit in with everyone around her because she cannot identify the same as the other teenagers -- black. Along with struggling with racial identity, Staggerlee is also seeking acceptance of her own sexuality. It isn't until her cousin, Trout, comes to visit her for the family where she is able to find comfort in someone to share her secrets. However, when Summer is over, Staggerlee has to find acceptance of her racial and sexual identity on her own.

Critical Analysis:
     The House you Pass on the Way is a novel written by Jacqueline Woodson. This novel incorporates a variety of themes relating to racial and sexual identity. In the beginning of this title, the author gives her readers a background on the protagonist, Staggerlee. The author depicts Staggerlee as a teenager who is searching for her own identity, both, racially and sexually. Staggerlee is described as a light-skinned girl with red brown hair due to her mother being white and her father being a black man. She struggles with her racial identity as her peers continually ask her what's it like to be both, black and white. As the author continues to describe Staggerlee's family and how her family is observed as the only mixed race family within their own black community, the author has displayed cultural markers indicating the racial bias that those who are neither black or white may endure. Supporting these indicators are the descriptions of Staggerlee's family. Her grandparents were depicted as racial heroes who fought for equality and justice and were commerorated with a statue that was built in the heart of their town. Moreover, Woodson describes how Staggerlee's father's side of the family don't communicate with them due to him choosing to marry a white woman. These descriptions further suggest that this took place in the 1960's during a time of civil rights. Woodson does a great job of incorporating various cultural markers within this storyline as she also explores and depicts the struggles of racial and sexual identity.

Review Excerpts:

"Sitting big and silent with all her family's land spread out beyond it," Staggerlee Canan's house, once belonging to her famous grandparents, stands as a refuge from the townspeople's gossip about her parents' "mixed" marriage. Here the pensive 14-year-old can quietly contemplate all the ways she is different from her classmates and her older sister, "smart, popular" Dotti. Staggerlee has never had a close friend besides Hazel back in sixth grade, the first and only girl she ever kissed. But when her cousin Tyler (called "Trout") comes to spend the summer, the two girls are drawn together by their common heritage and longings. As soft-spoken and poetic as the heroine herself, Woodson's prose gracefully expresses Staggerlee's slow emergence from isolation as she and Trout grapple with their shared secret. Minor characters, Staggerlee's gregarious father, her independent, conspicuously white mother ("it's only three, four white women in all of Sweet Gum") and her four diverse siblings add depth and complexity to the heroine's small world. Using a nondidactic approach, the author gently probes questions regarding racism and homosexuality in this poignant tale about growing pains and the ongoing process of self-discovery." - Publishers Weekly

"In this understated story set in a small, mostly African-American community in the South, Staggerlee Canan is shunned by her peers because her mother is white. This is not the sole cause of her isolation, however. She has a secret. In sixth grade, she had kissed another girl. Rejected by that friend, Staggerlee has no one to talk to about her sexual feelings until her adopted cousin. Both wonder if they are gay, but sexual identity is really only one of the things that troubles them. Their platonic intimacy is the intense kind shared by friends who see themselves as different from the crowd. Asked by Trout to say whether she's black or white, Staggerlee replies, "I'm me. That's all." That they seem to be taking different paths in the end adds to the story's poignancy. This richly layered novel will be appreciated for its affecting look at the anxious wonderings of presexual teens, its portrait of a complex interracial family, and its snapshot of the emotionally wrenching but inarticulate adolescent search for self. It's notable both for its quality and for the out-of-the-way places it goes." - School Library Journal 

"A newfound confidante and a breath of common sense clears away a teenager's guilt and dismay over her dawning sexual preference in this thoughtful, deceptively low-key story from Woodson. The middle child in the county's only mixed-race family, Evangeline defiantly changed her name years ago to Staggerlee, after the anti-hero in a ballad, but the finger-pointing has driven her within herself, leaving her friendless and lonely—lonelier still for the memory of the pleasure she took in kissing a girl in grade school. Along comes Trout, another self-named teenager, from a branch of the family that had cut off her parents after their marriage. The attraction is quick, strong, and mutual; Trout's visit may be a short one, but it's long enough for each to open up, find the courage to say the word gay—and to remember that they're only 14, too young to close off options. Woodson takes readers another step down the road when Trout later writes to admit that she's gone head over heels for a guy, and Staggerlee, though feeling betrayed, realizes that she and Trout are both growing and going their own ways. A provocative topic, treated with wisdom and sensitivity, with a strong secondary thread exploring some of the inner and outer effects of biracialism." - Kirkus Reviews

Connections:
Other titles also written by Jacqueline Woodson include: The First Part Last, Miracle's Boys, and From the Notebooks of Melanin Sun.

Interactivity:

• Ask audience whether or not they've shared a secret with someone they could trust, and has it helped them in coping or dealing with it.
• Let readers know that it's perfectly okay to be themselves and if they don't want to constrict themselves into one particular category, they don't have to. 
• Facilitate a discussion around growing and continually maturing around one's own. Acknowledge that there is no age limit to maturity within yourself.