Fran Ross (1935–1985)

Christine Clark, ironically nicknamed Oreo as a toddler, is a young person on a quest. Born to a black mother and a Jewish father—a marriage that neither family approved from the beginning—Oreo has spent her life torn between two cultures, reflecting her mixed-heritage origins. She and her younger brother also come from a broken home, having been raised in Philadelphia by their maternal grandparents following the parents’ divorce. Helen, the mother, has no interest in raising the kids, spending most of her time on the road pursuing an entertainment career. Sam, the father, just simply disappeared to New York City, cutting off all contact with the family. Determined to learn the secret of her birth, a teen-aged Oreo sets out to find her father, with only some cryptic clues he has left to guide her. Once she hits the streets of New York, Oreo’s journey turns into a true picaresque adventure involving an improbable series of events, characters, and mishaps as she tracks down the multitude of people in the phone book who share Sam’s name. Will Oreo ever find her father and how will that quest change her life?

This is the basic plot of Oreo, Fran Ross’ remarkable novel that is at once a searing social satire, a perceptive commentary on racial and ethnic identities, a brilliant lampoon of the Theseus saga from Greek mythology, and an affecting coming-of-age tale of a young woman seeking her place in the world. Written about a half-century ago, it is hard to understand how a book this creative, insightful, and outright hilarious could have languished in relative obscurity for so many years. The wordplay in the book is nothing short of masterful and it is very, very funny in many places. Of course, I found myself relying on both an online Yiddish dictionary and a reader’s guide to the Theseus myth to understand many of those jokes, barbs, and puns—Oreo’s myriad encounters on her journey do indeed parallel those of Theseus as he worked his way home—but that effort was amply rewarded. While Oreo may have been underappreciated when it was published, since its “rediscovery” a few years ago it has apparently become a cult classic and a work that has clearly influenced a new generation of literature (e.g., Paul Beatty’s equally brilliant The Sellout). That is a fitting end for a book that has been on such a lengthy quest of its own.… (meer)