Small Great Things
Jodi Picoult’s Small Great Things (2016) explores themes of race, privilege, and justice through the story of Ruth Jefferson, an African American labor and delivery nurse accused of causing the death of a white supremacist couple’s newborn. The novel alternates perspectives between Ruth, the infant’s father Turk Bauer, and Ruth’s public defender Kennedy McQuarrie, revealing systemic racism and personal biases. Inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s quote about doing “small things in a great way,” the narrative examines moral dilemmas and societal structures. The book has been praised for its thought-provoking examination of contemporary racial tensions and is being adapted into a film.
Stage Two: Pushing — Turk 3
byPicoult, Jodi
The chapter opens with a dramatic confrontation during a media event for the White Power Movement. A Black woman approaches Brittany Bauer, a prominent figure in the movement, and claims Brittany is half-Black. This revelation shocks Turk, Brittany’s husband, who has built his identity around white supremacy. The accusation is confirmed when Francis, Brittany’s father and a leader in the movement, admits that Brittany’s mother was Black. Turk grapples with the realization that his wife and deceased son were part-Black, shattering his worldview and leaving him emotionally unmoored. Brittany, overwhelmed, flees the scene, unable to process the truth about her heritage.
As Turk and Francis search for Brittany, the chapter delves into Francis’s backstory. He reveals that he fell in love with Adele, a Black woman, before joining the White Power Movement. Their relationship soured when Adele allegedly cheated with a Black choir director, leading Francis to threaten her life if she tried to take Brittany. Adele left, and Francis raised Brittany alone, indoctrinating her into the movement. His confession exposes the hypocrisy at the heart of their lives, as Francis admits he turned to hate to avoid confronting his own pain and loss. The revelation fractures the trust within their extremist community, with many members abandoning them.
Turk struggles to reconcile his love for Brittany with his ingrained racism. The chapter highlights his internal conflict as he realizes his wife’s identity contradicts everything he has fought for. Meanwhile, Francis’s guilt and fear of losing Brittany mirror Turk’s turmoil. The narrative underscores how their hateful ideology collapses under the weight of personal truth, leaving both men isolated and desperate. Turk’s determination to find Brittany suggests a glimmer of humanity beneath his extremist facade, though his motivations remain conflicted.
The chapter concludes with Turk and Francis continuing their search, now stripped of their community and forced to confront their pasts. Francis’s admission that he taught Brittany how to disappear adds irony to their predicament. Turk, focused solely on finding his wife, seems to prioritize her over the movement, hinting at a potential shift in his priorities. The chapter ends on a tense note, with Turk hinting at one final idea to locate Brittany, leaving the reader to wonder whether their search will lead to redemption or further tragedy.
FAQs
1. What is the shocking revelation that disrupts Turk’s worldview in this chapter, and how does he react?
Answer:
The chapter reveals that Turk’s wife Brittany is actually half-black, a fact concealed by her father Francis. This shatters Turk’s white supremacist identity, as he realizes he’s been living with and had a child with a Black woman. Turk experiences profound cognitive dissonance, describing it as “free-falling” with “the ground rushing up” at him. His reaction mixes disbelief (“I don’t know who my wife is. I don’t know who I am”), visceral disgust (“I feel my stomach turn”), and existential crisis as his racist ideology collapses when confronted with this personal connection to the very people he hated.2. How does Francis’s backstory about Adele complicate our understanding of his racist ideology?
Answer:
Francis’s confession reveals his racism developed as a psychological defense mechanism after his painful breakup with Adele, Brit’s Black mother. He describes genuinely loving her (“God help me, I loved her”) before their relationship fractured over cultural differences (her Black church community) and his abusive jealousy. His racism began as self-loathing transferred outward after meeting white supremacist Tom Metzger, who gave him “something to hate instead of hating myself.” This backstory presents racism not as innate hatred but as a learned coping strategy for personal trauma, making his character more psychologically complex while not excusing his actions.3. Analyze the symbolic significance of Brittany’s flight from the courthouse.
Answer:
Brittany’s physical flight mirrors the psychological escape all three characters desperately need. Her running represents both her rejection of this shattered identity (“No,” she says. “No.”) and her skill at disappearing that Francis taught her. The description “she is small, and she is fast…she learned, like me, from the best” ironically highlights how the survival skills Francis imparted now enable her to flee from him. This moment symbolizes the collapse of their carefully constructed white supremacist world - just as their racist network abandons them (“Our network…is no longer available”), Brittany literally runs from the false identity built on her father’s lies.4. How does this chapter use dramatic irony regarding Turk’s relationship with Brittany?
Answer:
The chapter employs powerful dramatic irony through Turk’s retrospective realization that his hatred was fundamentally misdirected. He reflects “For years I would have easily said I’d knife someone black before I’d sit down for coffee with them, and all this time, I’ve been living with one,” highlighting how his racism blinded him to his wife’s true heritage. The irony deepens when considering their deceased son - “my own son, he was part-black too” - making Turk’s previous racist actions against medical staff even more tragically misguided. This irony serves to critique how racism distorts perception, as Turk notes “We see what we’re told to see,” until truth violently disrupts the illusion.5. What does Francis’s confession reveal about the generational cycle of hate?
Answer:
Francis’s story illustrates how hatred propagates through generations via trauma and deception. His racism began as self-preservation after losing Adele (“easier to hate them, than to hate myself”), then became Brit’s inheritance through deliberate omission (“I never told Brit”). The chapter shows this cycle breaking in real time - Francis’s hate ideology created a daughter skilled enough to escape him, while Turk’s revelation may prompt ideological collapse. Francis’s lament “I’m going to lose her too…I taught her” underscores how the very skills used to sustain hate (disappearing, distrust) ultimately undermine it when truth emerges, suggesting hate’s self-defeating nature across generations.
Quotes
1. “We see what we’re told to see.”
This pivotal moment captures Turk’s realization about the constructed nature of racial perception, as he processes the revelation that his white supremacist wife Brittany may have Black heritage. The simple yet profound statement underscores the chapter’s exploration of how prejudice shapes reality.
2. “For years I would have easily said I’d knife someone black before I’d sit down for coffee with them, and all this time, I’ve been living with one. I made a baby with one.”
Turk’s visceral crisis of identity lays bare the chapter’s central tension - the collapse of his racist worldview when confronted with intimate contradictions. The shocking self-awareness marks a turning point in his character arc.
3. “It was so much easier to hate them, than to hate myself.”
Francis’s confession about joining the white power movement reveals the psychological roots of racism as a defense mechanism. This insight into the emotional origins of hate ideologies gives depth to the chapter’s examination of extremism.
4. “She knows how to cover her tracks, how to disappear. I taught her.”
The tragic irony of Francis’s lament underscores the chapter’s theme of unintended consequences, as the survival skills he imparted to his daughter now enable her to escape the toxic ideology he also taught her. This moment highlights the generational impacts of hate.