Neither Black nor White yet Both : Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature

Why can a "white" woman give birth to a "black" baby, while a "black" woman can never give birth to a "white" baby in the United States?

What makes racial "passing" so different from social mobility?

Why are interracial and incestuous relations often confused or conflated in literature, making "miscegenation" appear as if it were incest?

Werner Sollors examines these questions and others in this investigation of literary works that, in the past, have been read more for a black-white contrast of "either-or" thatn for an interracial realm of "neither, nor, both and in-between".From the origins of the term "race" to the cultural sources of the "Tragic Mulatto", and from the calculus of colour to the retellings of various plots, this work examines what is known about race, analyzing recurrent motifs in scientific and legal works as well as in fiction, drama and poetry.