Rebirths In E. L. Doctorow's Ragtime

In the classic E.L. Doctorow novel, Ragtime, we see the juxtaposition of many motifs to represent Doctorow's view of the early century. By combining history and fiction Doctorow allows himself to write a semi-accurate interpretation of the early 1900's while also being able to strongly express his own biases and opinions of the era. The biggest, and perhaps most important theme Doctorow applies in the novel is social tension, or the battle of the rich versus the poor. Other important themes include rebirth, racial tension, and high randomness of events. By using these themes and others, movie makers created a film, which they believe best represents Doctorow's views.

It is apparent that Doctorow clearly favors the poor, lower class, in
Doctorow commonly has a character go through a major transmogrification, or rebirth. This rebirth ordinarily happens when moving from one social class to another. Tateh, Houdini, Coalhouse, and mother's younger brother and clearly are examples of these rebirths. When Tateh goes from being a poor street peddler to a rich movie maker, he goes through a transformation. Tateh starts dressing and acting a lot differently, perhaps also forgetting his Jewish heritage and 5000 years of oppression. Houdini's alteration is greater than Tateh's. Houdini goes from a not so well off family to a rich and famous escape artist. Through this social change, Houdini changes his Jewish name Erich Weiss to a more appropriate Christian name of Harry Houdini. As well as changing his name, Houdini also seemed to forget his background. However, later in the novel we find out that Houdini did in fact not forget his heritage. He just changed his name as a career move. Coalhouse Walker's rebirth is much more dramatic and swift than Tateh's or Houdini's. Coalhouse goes from a fine upstanding citizen to a disgruntled man, caught at the end of a racist prank, and out for revenge. At one point, "He sat down with a sheet over his shoulder and permitted one of the young men to shave his head and his neat mustache. The change in him was striking," (). This symbolic and actual rebirth occurs as Coalhouse moves from being a wealthy prominent musician to a
Without it, the book simply would be neither entertaining nor fulfilling. In writing Ragtime, Doctorow knew that racial tension was the most obvious theme in his book, as well as being the foundation for a major plot in the book. One does not have to dig to deeply in order to discover that Doctorow believes that there was racial tension and blatant racism in the early century. To represent this racial tension, Doctorow uses a mix of fiction and history. On the fictional side, Doctorow has Coalhouse Walker and his fiancй Sarah. On the historical side, Doctorow has Booker T. Washington, a famous black rights leader who believed in non-violent methods. Doctorow has Coalhouse and Sarah interact with other fictional characters, the Vice President of the United States, Willie Conklin, the other firemen, and others in order to put racial tension in place. Then Doctorow has Coalhouse have a conversation with the famous Booker T. Washington. This interaction shows the extent to which Doctorow believed in the racial tension many years ago. The book shows that Doctorow believed racial tension to be a strong driving force in the actions of the early 1900's. The film did justice to the book in that respect. The film accurately portrayed strong racial tension, as well as a beautiful dialogue between Coalhouse and Booker T. Washington. After Washington made a fabulous and convincing speech to Coalhouse, Coalhouse replied, "My