“Once a bitch always a bitch, what I say. I says you’re lucky if her playing out of school is all that worries you. I says she ought to be down there in that kitchen right now, instead of up there in her room, gobbing paint on her face and waiting for six niggers that cant even stand up out of a chair unless they’ve got a pan full of bread and meat to balance them, to fix breakfast for her.”

            This passage is from Jason’s point of view in chapter three. This is the beginning of a conversation that took place between Jason and his mother regarding Quentin. Jason’s mother has just found out that Quentin has been skipping school.

            This passage is the very first part of Jason’s narrative and says a lot about him as a character. For him to say “bitch” in front of his mother is one thing that I found to be very disrespectful. I think that this reveals a bit of Jason’s personality because he didn’t seem to care that he was calling his niece a bitch to his mother. The second sentence also stood out to me in this passage. This sentence stands out to me because it shows the level of respect; or lack there of that he has for his mother. To me, this statement implies that he thinks his mother is naïve for thinking that the only worry she should have about Quentin was her skipping school.