Home Going By Yaa Gyasi Analysis

Even separated by 7 generations and the Atlantic Ocean, family always finds a way. Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi follows the lives of two sisters separated at birth as well as the events of the lives of their descendants for 7 generations. I’m going to specifically focus on the 7th generation, Marjorie and Marcus. Marjorie is a first-generation American who still feels that she is Ghanaian. Her family moved to America when she was young but she returned to Ghana every summer to visit her grandmother until she died of old age. Marcus is an African American who grew up in Harlem barely knowing his mother but close to his father and grandmother. Despite the very different circumstances of their births and young childhoods, Marjorie and Marcus are very similar by the time they become young adults. They are drawn to higher education, close to their family’s and have strong ties to their heritage …show more content…
She was an avid reader and was often mocked for it in school (269). but this did not deter her for “By senior year, she had read everything on the south wall of the school’s library, at least a thousand books, and was working her way through the north wall” (270-271). She was also close to her family. She cared deeply for her parents but felt closest to her grandmother. Every summer she would fly back to Ghana to spend a week or two with her grandmother until she passed away in Marjorie’s second year of high school (264). Whether she knows it or not Marjorie also exhibits a strong connection with her ancestors. She’s afraid of the fire that haunts her side of the family. She dislikes it to the point she doesn’t like graham playing with a lighter and asks him to put it away (274). Furthermore, when Mrs. Pinkston asks Marjorie to write a poem about “What being African American means to her” (273) for a black cultural event the school was hosting, this is what she presented: “Split the Castle