How old is rufus in kindred

Now much older, she has mellowed and is less cruel to Dana, who becomes her servant. It is assumed she did not die in the house fire Nigel set.

A middle-aged, strong-minded, and loyal slave who works in the cookhouse, Sarah nurses a hatred of Margaret Weylin for selling almost all her children except Carrie. Sarah is the sort of woman, Dana muses, who s Black Power members would claim capitulated to slavery, but Dana comes to see her strength amidst adversity.

She looks out for Dana throughout the novel, and is sold after Rufus's death. A sweet but mute slave girl and the daughter of Sarah, Carrie befriends Dana; she also eventually falls in love with and marries Nigel. She is not sold after Rufus's death. The son of Luke and a young boy when Dana first meets him, Nigel grows up a slave on the Weylin plantation.

He later marries Carrie and has children with her. He is friendly and helpful to Dana, and spends his time looking out for Rufus as well. He is assumed to have set the house fire at the end of the novel to cover up Dana's killing of Rufus.

He is apparently not sold after Rufus's death. Nigel's father, a strong and independent slave. He believes he can say and do mostly what he pleases, but eventually is sold and learns that this is not the case.

A slave girl whom Dana befriends. She is the mistress first of Weylin, then Fowler. Rufus sells her. Alice and Rufus's son, Joe is sweet and smart. He calls Rufus "Daddy," and Dana is tasked with teaching him how to read. Dana's grandmother, the daughter of Alice and Rufus.

Dana is waiting for her to be born in order for her family line to continue. The Question and Answer section for Kindred is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel. Many of the characters within Kindred resist classification. The first time Dana meets Rufus, he's nothing more than a little boy who's frustrated with his mean father and spoiling mother. He has lots of ways of acting out and many of them are dangerous, like setting stuff on fire.

Anyway, I got mad and burned down the stable" 2. It's safe to say that Rufus has always gotten mixed messages from his parents. His mother gives him whatever he wants and his father gives him nothing he wants. That's pretty confusing for a kid, and no, the two extremes don't balance each other out. That's like saying that constant bursts of scalding hot and ice cold water will help a personal feel more normal over time. Dana likes to think that Rufus will grow up to be a good man.

But the evidence quickly shows that this probably won't be the case. After all, Dana is fighting the entire world for Rufus' soul. How can she teach him respect for black people when the entire world around him says that it's wrong to treat black people as equals? Dana knows that she has failed when she walks in on Rufus getting beaten up for trying to rape a girl named Alice.

She thinks that, "If everything was as it seemed, Rufus had earned his beating and more. Maybe he had grown up to be even worse than I had feared" 4. And the answer is yes: Rufus has grown up to be worse than she feared. By the time he's old enough to have a sex drive, Rufus starts trying to have sex with a black woman named Alice. She wants nothing to do with him, but for him the shame of being rejected by a black woman is too much to bear. After an unsuccessful attempt to rape Alice, he asks Dana to go to Alice and convince her that her entire life will be miserable unless she gives in to his demands.

But Dana nurses him back to health. Dana starts reading to Rufus in the evenings while Kevin tutors him during the day. They seem to make some inroads into making Rufus a better guy, especially when it comes to how he treats slaves.

The next time Dana travels back in time, she catches Rufus getting beaten up after he has tried to rape a black woman named Alice. Dana saves his life again even though she's starting to wonder whether he's worth saving. Rufus asks Dana to help him have sex with Alice. Dana hates the idea but knows that Rufus and Alice will have to have children if she Dana is ever going to be born. Rufus grows up to have children with Alice, but Alice hangs herself when Rufus lies to her about selling their children to a slave trader.