Defining the argument of Doctorow's Ragtime is no easy task. What at first glance seem like separate stories about completely different characters living in the same place and at the same time, are actually a complex structure in which all the characters seem to intertwine in one way or another. However, the title of the novel is an important hint to understand the topic of the novel. The Ragtime musical genre is characterized by its irregularities and its melodies that seem to avoid metrical beats by accentuating the weaker ones (which are normally not accented). The accentuation of the rhythms results in a melody that invites the listener to move, thus avoiding stability. When trying to connect this metaphor to the text, the reader may detect multiple examples of characters who present a conflict between their “strong” and “weak” rhythms, due to their race, their gender, or any other reason. It is this conflict (trying to find a midpoint between who they are and who they should be) that causes the characters to constantly evolve throughout the novel. This essay, therefore, will demonstrate, by analyzing the characters of Houdini and his mother's younger brother, how Ragtime is a novel that describes the creation of identity, race being the most worrying aspect that makes the characters reflect on who they are and how it defines them. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay The mother's younger brother is one of the characters that readers are told the least about but, nevertheless, it is possible to deduce his thoughts by carefully reading the little information that the narrator offers. As a young white man living in the epicenter of capitalism in the early 20th century, his family expects him to earn a living on his own, starting his own business or, on the other hand, contributing to his father's business. However, from the beginning of the novel, he shows no intention of accomplishing any of these, but he also shows no other kind of intention. The mother's younger brother is a very mysterious character, as he does not manifest a clear identity, probably because he does not have one. He is always hiding or disguising himself as other people, always protecting himself from all those expectations and stereotypes he is expected to embrace; it is not possible to know what his identity is, but it is possible to know what his identity is not. To me, the mother's younger brother is the perfect example of a person in the making. When he feels some sort of threat of being discovered, his first instinct is to hide, as happens in chapter 8, when he hides in the closet so as not to be discovered by Goldman and Evelyn. In addition to hiding, the mother's younger brother also adopts disguises. Since he lacks an identity, disguising himself as another person allows him to adopt an identity, even if it is not his own. This happens repeatedly throughout the novel, Coalhouse's adoption of the cause in Chapter XXX being the most notable. At the end of the novel he dies fighting for a cause that is not strictly his, but therefore, in some way, it can be assumed that it is not really him who dies; it is his body that dies, but not him as a person, as an identity, because he never truly existed. Furthermore, Houdini is also a perfect example of a character who struggles with his identity due to his race. As a Jewish immigrant, he is lost in “limbo” in a society divided into black and white, because he is neither. Therefore, he adopts an Italian surname in hopes of creating a new identity for himself, fully embracing the identity that his mother's younger brother is trying to escape: a young white man. However, there is a turning point in the. 247-260.