Lost in the Woods

In The House Behind the Cedars, Rena is loved by three men: one proud and passionate, another abusive and wild, the last worshipful and silent.  Each is of a different racial background: Tryon is “pure” white, Wain is mixed black and white (but more black, and less white, than Rena), and Frank is a dark-skinned black.  Rena’s eventual resolution never to marry is based in part on her confusion about which “caste” she “belongs to”: she does not think she has the right to really be white, but neither will she “lower herself” to marry someone of darker skin.  Her mother would prefer, if Rena cannot be with a white man, that she marry someone (and socialize with people) of mixed heritage, as shown at the party where most of the guests are more than half white.