Washington Black

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2018

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Part 3, Chapters, 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 3: “Nova Scotia, 1834”

Part 3, Chapter 1 Summary

Chasing after Titch, Wash becomes lost in the snow. He remembers little of this time, only “a hand on my arm, a sensation of being dragged, half-carried backwards through howling wind […] the snow all around […] the light, how it seemed to break and dissipate into smoke, and the taste of frost in my mouth, like rust” (203). Peter finds Wash and drags him back to camp, and Wash wakes up next to Mr. Wilde. Wash learns that while crews are out searching for Titch, there has been no sign of him. Although his crew tries to dissuade him, after several days, Mr. Wilde sets out to look for Titch, accompanied by Peter.

The two men return without Titch, and Wash can tell that Mr. Wilde believes his son is dead, although he does not explicitly say so. Mr. Wilde falls ill from the cold, and Peter is worried and restless. Thinking Titch dead, Wash thinks about Philip and reflects that “his single vicious gesture” had granted him a “new life” (207). Wash helps to tend to Mr. Wilde, and is at his bedside when he passes away. After Mr. Wilde’s death, Wash decides to leave the encampment and venture out on his own. Peter gives Wash money, provisions, and his choice of books before sending him on his way.

Part 3, Chapter 2 Summary

Having heard about them from Titch, Wash resolves to travel to the loyalists in Canada and books passage on a ship. Because prejudiced sailors pick on Wash, he spends most of his time in his quarters. When Wash arrives in Shelburne, he finds it much less of a paradise than he had hoped for, and that the “free, golden existence once described to me had been used up, crushed, drained to the skin by all who’d come before” (210). He works in a fishery, but he is constantly afraid and full of melancholy.

Wash tries going by a different name for a time, but eventually settles back on Washington Black. He realizes that even though there are free black people in the north, discrimination still exists against those with dark skin. He finds work as a chef in Bedford Basin, but is adrift, lonely, and without purpose. He realizes that “there could be no belonging for a creature such as myself, anywhere: a disfigured black boy with a scientific turn of mind and a talent on canvas, running, always running, from the dimmest of shadows” (211). He finds a new job working at the docks, but his coworkers treat him poorly. One night, while working, Wash sees a group of iridescent jellyfish floating in the water, reawakening his interest in art and science.

Part 3, Chapter 3 Summary

Wash is amazed that he had almost “let all wonder, all curiosity, seep” from him (214). He finds work as a deliveryman, which allows him to draw in the afternoons. He rents a room in a lodging house and befriends the house’s caretaker, a black man named Medwin Harris. When Wash and Medwin hear that slavery has ended in the West Indies, they decide to go out drinking to celebrate. Wash is “overwhelmed by thoughts of Faith, of Gaius, and especially of Big Kit” (216). At the bar, two other black men pick a fight with them, but Medwin brutally finishes it.

Part 3, Chapters 1-3 Analysis

These chapters represent an abrupt and unwelcome transition in Wash’s life. Abandoned by Titch, he must make his own way in the world. While given a little help from Peter in the form of food and money, Wash is on his own from a young age and must fend for himself to survive.

Titch’s disappearance reflects his selfish and impulsive nature. After fleeing to the Arctic to discover that Mr. Wilde is alive, Titch causes the very death he hoped was untrue. Titch abandons both Mr. Wilde and Wash, who is by this point close to a surrogate son, to escape the responsibilities and complications that come with those relationships. Titch is presumed dead, turning a selfish action into the ultimate act of denial, forsaking all his personal and professional responsibilities for the sake of his own needs and desires.

Adrift in the world, Wash struggles to find his footing, and he realizes that freedom in name only has its own accompanying struggles and hardships. Wash struggles with racism from strangers and coworkers alike, and at times feels incredibly lonely and even, occasionally, close to death. While it seems as if his life with Titch might have had some purpose, his life now is a series of odd jobs, bad drinks, and few friends, illustrating the ways that poverty and systemic racism further isolate Wash from the world. One bright spot amid this suffering is Wash’s renewed interest in art and science after seeing the jellyfish. This interest in the natural world gives Wash’s life a meaning that it otherwise lacks.