Racism Theme Analysis

The town of Two Mills is neatly divided into two segregated halves: white people live in the West End and black people live in the East End. When Maniac Magee (a white kid from elsewhere) arrives in town, running from a life as an orphan, he doesn’t know this. In fact, he doesn’t seem to be aware of racial difference at all. Racial prejudice is incomprehensible to him because he is just an orphan looking for a sense of belonging, and he sees everyone he meets as potential friends and family, regardless of race. By telling the story of Two Mills through Maniac’s innocent perspective, Spinelli suggests that racism, which is founded on ignorance and lack of empathy, ultimately doesn’t make sense and can only be defeated by people who are willing to cross invisible boundaries in order to make friends.

Maniac lacks awareness of the hostility between racial groups in Two Mills, which leads him to think and behave in innocent ways that kids who’ve lived in the town all their lives probably wouldn’t. In one instance, Mars Bar, a black boy who is the East End’s most notorious bully, sarcastically offers Maniac a bite of his candy bar (trying to provoke him into a fight). Maniac actually accepts, to the astonishment of everyone watching: “The kid had done the unthinkable, he had chomped on one of Mars's own bars. Not only that, but white kids just didn't put their mouths where black kids had had theirs, be it soda bottles, spoons, or candy bars. And the kid hadn't even gone for the unused end; he had chomped right over Mars Bar's own bite marks.” Spinelli uses this lighthearted scene to highlight the ugliness of racism in a deeper way. A local white kid would consider a black kid’s candy bar to be untouchable, whereas Maniac just sees it as the sincere offering of a possible friend.

After being befriended by Amanda Beale, a black girl, and then invited to live with the Beale family for a while, Maniac still feels baffled by the concept of racial difference, thinking, “he still couldn't see it, this color business. He didn't figure he was white any more than the East Enders were black. He looked himself over pretty hard and came up with at least seven different shades and colors right on his own skin, not one of them being what he would call white.” In other words, Maniac—having gotten a taste of genuine family life for the first time—still thinks about race in a superficial, literal way and finally decides, in light of his experience, that it doesn’t make much sense to him—a reaction Spinelli uses to signal that, in fact, racism is an arbitrary and foolish prejudice.

However, Maniac’s innocence doesn’t last forever: he is initially rejected because of his naïveté of the town’s racial hostility, leading him to recognize the reality of racism and its roots in ignorance. During a community party in the East End, Maniac gradually picks one jeering voice out of the happy crowd: “The voice was behind him, saying the same word over and over […] But when he saw the brown finger pointed at him (not a speck of icing on it), and the brown arm that aimed it and the brown face behind it, he knew the name [he heard] was ‘Whitey.’ And it surprised him that he knew.” The parenthetical remark about icing refers to Mrs. Beale, who would always offer him a taste of frosting while she baked his favorite cake. That maternal image contrasts harshly with the accusing finger of the elderly man, who then tells Maniac to leave the East End and join “his kind” on the opposite side of town. Suddenly, the reality of hostility based on race—an idea that has been present only vaguely in Maniac’s mind—becomes unavoidably manifest, because this time it is directed at him.

Not long after this incident, Maniac does walk out of Two Mills, feeling responsible for bringing hostility on the Beales, who’ve sheltered him. “So he turned and started walking north on Hector, right down the middle of the street, right down the invisible chalk line that divided East End from West End. Cars beeped at him, drivers hollered, but he never flinched. […] [People on] [b]oth sides were calling for him to come over. And then they were calling at each other, then yelling, then cursing. But nobody stepped off a curb, everybody kept moving north, an ugly, snarling black-and-white escort for the kid in the middle.” Maniac is portrayed as being “in the middle” of a divided town whose two sides refuse to face each other directly. The reactions of others suggest that an innocent outlook like Maniac’s can’t survive in a community that is divided by hatred.

When Maniac eventually wanders back to Two Mills, having been rejected by everyone, he has a clearer perspective on the racism he’s encountered in various residents: “Remembering how little Grayson had known about black people and black homes. Thinking of the McNabs' wrong-headed notions. […] What else would you expect? Whites never go inside blacks' homes. Much less inside their thoughts and feelings. And blacks are just as ignorant of whites […] and the less they knew about each other, the more they invented.” Now that Maniac has been exposed to the ugliness of racism and experienced some degree of ostracism himself, he has a better understanding of what fuels it: in his opinion, simple ignorance and a refusal to understand other perspectives or get too close to other people’s lives. Such ignorance allows harmful fabrications to take root and flourish, further dividing the community.

When Maniac hides in the town zoo, figuring he’s not wanted elsewhere, he is eventually found and coaxed to leave by Mars Bar (who has softened toward him) and Amanda, whose household he finally rejoins. The simplicity of the ending reflects the simplicity of Maniac’s perspective on racism throughout the story. Maniac doesn’t spontaneously heal the town’s deep-seated divisions; rather, his willingness to simply befriend individuals who are outwardly different from him, and even to live with them, is meant to signal a hopeful approach for the future. In this way, Spinelli vindicates Maniac’s perspective—the key to countering hostility and division, the book suggests, is friendship.