67 pages • 2 hours read

Americanah

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2013

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Chapters 34-37Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 34 Summary

At a Blogging While Brown convention in Washington DC, Ifemelu runs into Blaine, whom she has not seen for nearly a decade since their fateful train conversation. They recognize each other immediately, and he apologizes for not returning her calls. He was in a relationship at the time, but is now single. They flirt long-distance from Baltimore to New Haven, where he still lives and works as a professor at Yale, and then begin visiting each other. They begin dating, and Ifemelu is impressed by the fact that he does not have “a normal spine, but…a firm reed of goodness” (383). As she works from home, she is free to visit Blaine often, and does so. He introduces her to organic food, a chemical-free life, and she imagines their future together, with Blaine as “a perfect father, this man of careful disciplines” (384).

Blaine begins to influence her blog. Her posts begin to sound more academic, less like her. She tells him that she only wants to observe, not explain, but he insists she has a duty to instruct. To do otherwise is “lazy” (387), a word he uses often. He is horrified when Ifemelu allows a white woman to touch her hair. “‘How else will she know what hair like mine feels like?’” (388) Ifemelu responds. She feels out of place among his friends, who look “at the world with an impractical, luminous earnestness” (388) that she does not feel. When she tells her parents about Blaine, they are happy, but insist he visit Nigeria and conduct wedding preparations in the proper way. Ifemelu reminds them that they are going slowly.

Chapter 35 Summary

Blaine’s sister, Shan, has a breakdown. Shan, a tempestuous writer, has a book coming out soon and is having a meltdown. She comes to visit them, and Ifemelu is struck by her “natural authority” (392); she has the “air of a person who was somehow chosen” (393). Shan and Ifemelu discuss Shan’s book, a memoir, as well as Ifemelu’s perspective on American race relations. Ifemelu offers to let Shan be a guest contributor on her blog, which Shan accepts.

Chapter 36 Summary

Blaine and Ifemelu attend a surprise party for one of his friends, Marcia. The party is attended by Blaine’s academic friends, a diverse, well-educated group of people with whom Ifemelu does not feel totally comfortable. It is also attended by Blaine’s ex-girlfriend, Paula. Paula has been assigning Ifemelu’s blog to her students, and reads a post out loud at the party, a piece about how non-American blacks can best discuss race with American blacks. It states that American blacks have a unique, painful racial history that an African-born person cannot understand. The guests like the piece, and then move on to discuss Obama, who is currently running for the Democratic nomination. Ifemelu, for her part, likes Hillary Clinton.

Back at Blaine’s apartment, Ifemelu becomes self-conscious and jealous of Paula, telling Blaine that because of their shared nationality, he and Paula have more in common than she and Blaine do. “She was jealous of the emotional remnants that existed between him and Paula, and by the thought that Paula was like him, good like him” (409).

Chapter 37 Summary

Dike is now a teenager, “six feet tall with lean muscles” (412). Ifemelu visits him and Uju while Dike has his friends over, almost all of whom are white and who “let [Dike] make their collective decisions” (412). Ifemelu sees how popular Dike is, how good he would be as a campus tour guide.

Blaine and Ifemelu attend one of Shan’s literary events, where Shan undercuts Blaine’s friends behind their backs and complains about the cover of her upcoming book, the way the image of the black body on the cover is sexualized. She talks about how her publisher demanded she “‘transcend race’” (416) something white people are not asked to do, and something Shan finds impossible to do. “‘White writers can be blunt about race and get all activist because their anger isn’t threatening,’” (417) an Asian party guest says.

Someone suggests that Ifemelu should blog about all this, but Shan cuts her down, claiming that Ifemelu can only write about race because she is African. If she had been born in Detroit, her anger would not be palatable to a mainstream audience. Ifemelu agrees, “disliking Shan and herself too, for bending to Shan’s spell” (418).

Chapter 34-37 Analysis

Throughout her relationship with Blaine, from their first meeting on the train to her post-breakup return to Nigeria, Ifemelu fantasizes about him. These are not sexual but rather domestic fantasies. She imagines Blaine as a perfect father, “blending organic fruits for the baby” (384). This is something she does not engage in with Curt or Obinze, the true love of her life. Blaine is an upright, principled individual, and Ifemelu finds it hard to keep up with all of his causes, much as she may admire them. She begins “…to floss…going to the gym, eating protein…” (384) because he has told her to, and “with him, she could only inhabit a higher level of goodness” (384). Ifemelu fantasizes about Blaine in a way she does fantasize about other boyfriends because Blaine himself is a fantasy, too good, too moral and steady to be the flawed and interesting Ifemelu’s true life partner. She sees fantasies because when she looks at him, all she sees is a perfect, principled hero.

Though Blaine is better able to understand the racially-charged environment in which Ifemelu finds herself, her relationship with Blaine allows her to see her own limitations and blind spots when it comes to race. At a party with his friends, she does not enjoy the greens, cornbread or fried chicken, staples of soul food, a traditional form of cooking among black Americans, particularly the descendants of slaves. “‘The fried chicken you eat is not the fried chicken I eat’” (409), she tells Blaine later. Though they may eat the same food and share the same skin color, their backgrounds are markedly different. During that same party, Ifemelu mentions her relatives in Nigeria. “‘It must be good to have that…to know where you’re from’” (406), a black American party guest replies. Ifemelu is taken aback, as if she has not truly considered the psychological ramifications of having one’s history stolen and erased, of not having an ancestral homeland or a lineage. Shan, Blaine’s sister, calls Ifemelu out on this—her American race blog that cannot include the perspective of American-born descendants of slaves. Shan claims that Ifemelu is in a better position to write this blog despite her limited perspective because “‘It’s all quaint and curious to her. So she can write it and get all these accolades and get invited to give talks. If she were African American, she’d just be labeled angry and shunned’” (418). What makes Ifemelu arguably less qualified to discuss race in America is precisely what makes her blog non-threatening and approachable.