Chapter 3

Lack of a clear cultural identity

As someone who has a black mother and a white father, Quey feels conflicted about
both where his home is and his identity. A half-caste is still viewed by whites as more
black than white. Similarly, natives see the lighter skin, hair, or eyes of a half-caste and
view that person as a curiosity, not really one of them. Having grown up among mostly
white people in the castle and then in London, Quey does not fully identify as British or
African. Quey certainly does not feel at home in his mother’s village, as he is eager to
finish his work with Fiifi as soon as possible.

Inability to express the romantic feelings

This lack of a clear home also extends to Quey’s inability to express his true sexual
identity. Although he fell in love with Cudjo and he is aware of his homosexuality, he
does not dare to express it, perhaps because he never feels completely at ease with
himself. This may be because he has been made to feel that everything about himself is
wrong, from the colour of his skin to his romantic preferences. An example of this is
that his father sends him to London when he surprised Cudjo and Quey laying together
in the ground, so he began to suspect about Quey’s homosexuality.

Generational trauma
Quey is also troubled by the slave-trading business. As son of James Collins, Quey is
caught up in the system. As a boy working for his father, he had to consciously ignore
the fact the numbers he recorded represented human beings from villages like his
mother's. He is trapped in the slave trade no matter where he lives or with which culture
he identifies. In the end, Quey feels he has no choice but to return to his mother’s
village, marry the woman Fiifi has kidnapped for him, and continue his mother’s
family’s role in the slave trade. This shows how difficult it is to escape the cycle of
generational trauma.

Chapter 4
Loss of a mother
This chapter and the book in general shows us how plenty of families are destroyed due
to slavery and villages wars. In particular, we can see how the separation between
mother and daughter is repeated in de majority of the chapters: Maame, lost her first
daughter the night she set the fire in Cobbe's village in order to escape She lost her
second daughter when Esi was captured and sent to Cape Coast Castle to be sold. Esi, in
turn, loses her own daughter when Ness is sold into slavery. Ness later loses her son and
husband during the doomed escape attempt from the Devil's plantation.

Loss of the personal identity

Ness has no knowledge of her past, she only has some memories of her mother.
Memories and family history are not passed down from parent to child. There are two
reasons. Firstly, the families are often split apart. But more insidiously, the plantation
owners do their best to remove any traces of their past, beating them for speaking even a
word in their native language.

Racism and violence

Racism and violence are two of the topics which are most present in the book, and this
chapter is not an exception. We can appreciate the violence in the Devil’s brutality,
which is shown in his murder of Sam and his beating of Ness, which leaves the woman
branded with both physical and emotional scars. Tom Jr. feels he has a right to humiliate
and beat Pinky simply because he is white (and male), and she is black. However,
characters like Ness show us courage and resistance. She refuses to let the violence and
racism destroy her, risking her live to achieve freedom and to protect those she loves.