Female Character of the Week: Cassie Logan

When looking back at the female characters I’ve highlighted since I started this blog, I noticed that, with the exception of Bonnie Bennett from The Vampire Diaries, they’re all a bunch of white girls.  I feel like Shirley from Community would look at my list and say, “Yeah, you’re all so different.  Skinny bitches.”  Keeping that in mind, this week I’m going to write about a childhood favorite from a beloved historical fiction book: Cassie Logan from Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.

Name: Cassie Logan

Why She Rocks: Living in Mississippi in the 1930s, Cassie is a rambunctious tomboy who would rather play in the dirt with her three brothers than wear dresses and sit quietly, though she doesn’t mind it when her mother styles her hair in her “grown up hairdo.”  She thinks school is boring, hates sitting in class, and prefers climbing trees to doing any kind of quiet work.  She has no problem telling people exactly how things are, and if she doesn’t like the way things are, she’ll be very honest about the way things should be.

This often gets her into trouble.  When the book begins, Cassie is only nine years old, and doesn’t yet understand the fine delineations of social behavior.  She knows her parents act differently around the white people than they do around other black people, but she doesn’t understand why.  Reality hits her hard when a twelve-year-old white girl and her father humiliate her in front of a crowd of onlookers, and she is expected to apologize for getting in the older girl’s way in the middle of the street.

Cassie’s parents both have to explain to her that the world is unfair and she won’t always be treated with the respect she deserves, especially not from white people.  She listens, and understands, but decides to take matters into her own hands and craft her revenge.  She befriends the girl who humiliated her and becomes her little confidante, carrying her books to and from school.  One day, Cassie takes “Miz Lillian Jean” to the woods, throws the books on the ground, and refuses to carry them anymore.  Lillian Jean slaps Cassie across the face, and Cassie promptly kicks the crap out of Lillian Jean until she gets the apology she deserves.  When Lillian Jean threatens to tell her father, Cassie promises to reveal all of Lillian Jean’s secrets to all of her friends…and suddenly, the older girl doesn’t feel the need to expose her anymore.

Up until the Lillian Jean incident, Cassie was a very reactionary girl.  She had a temper, and when she (justifiably) felt that she was being treated unfairly, she let everyone know it whether it was wise to do so or not.  But she handled this situation very admirably.  She forced an apology out of the girl who humiliated her, but still ensured that the girl’s father wouldn’t do anything to take revenge on her family.  In the two sequels, Let the Circle be Unbroken and The Road to Memphis, Cassie continues to learn how to navigate the two different worlds she inhabits, but never loses her self-respect and her knowledge that she deserves better.  No matter what happens to her and her family, she holds onto her pride.  I want all little girls to read about Cassie in elementary and middle school and feel inspired by her spunk.