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Dr. George Gey
Henrietta’s youngest child, Joe is physically and emotionally abused after his mother dies. He grows up with severe mental issues and problems with authority and is eventually imprisoned for murder. In jail, he converts to Islam and changes his name to Zakariyya Bari Abdul Rahman. Eventually Deborah and Rebecca help him learn more about his mother’s legacy, and he is deeply moved by what he finds.
Joe Lacks (Zakariyya) Quotes in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
The The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks quotes below are all either spoken by Joe Lacks (Zakariyya) or refer to Joe Lacks (Zakariyya). For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 30 Quotes
Only people that can get any good from my mother cells is the people that got money, and whoever sellin them cells—they get rich off our mother and we got nothing…All those damn people didn’t deserve her help as far as I’m concerned.
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Chapter 32 Quotes
Deborah and Zakariyya stared at the screen like they’d gone into a trance, mouths open, cheeks sagging. It was the closest they’d come to seeing their mother alive since they were babies.
[Deborah] raised the vial and touched it to her lips. “You’re famous,” she whispered, “Just nobody knows it.”
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Joe Lacks (Zakariyya) Character Timeline in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
The timeline below shows where the character Joe Lacks (Zakariyya) appears in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1: The Exam
About a week later, the twenty-nine-year-old Henrietta is pregnant yet again with Joe, her fifth child. Sadie and Margaret believe that the pain had to do with the...
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...The chart also details that Henrietta has an epileptic daughter. Two months ago, after delivering Joe, Henrietta had significant blood in her urine, and the cells around her cervix seemed abnormal....
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Chapter 5: Blackness Be Spreadin All Inside
...As she grew older, however, Elsie began to have accidents. When Henrietta became pregnant with Joe, the couple could no longer care for Elsie. On the advice of doctors, they moved...
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Chapter 15: “Too Young to Remember”
Deborah, Sonny, and Joe are never told exactly what happened to their mother. In the meantime, their cousin Ethel...
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...leaves. If they ever stop, Ethel beats them. She focuses most of her vitriol on Joe, hitting him for no reason, forcing him to stand in a dark basement for hours...
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Chapter 19: “The Most Critical Time on Earth is Now”
...Deborah’solder brothers, Lawrence has opened a convenience store, and Sonny has joined the air force. Joe, however, has been fighting with teachers and fellow students. He drops out of school, ends...
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Only weeks later, a boy named Eldridge Lee Ivy threatens Joe. For three months, Joe ignores him, but in September 1970, after a night of drinking...
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Chapter 23: “It’s Alive”
...about. A short while after, Hsu writes to Lawrence asking if someone can go to Zakariyya’s prison to collect blood from him. Along with her letter, she encloses a copy of...
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Chapter 26: Breach of Privacy
Zakariyya, meanwhile, is paroled after seven years in prison. He continues to have problems with anger...
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Chapter 30: Zakariyya
The next day, Deborah takes the apprehensive Rebecca to meet Zakariyya. They travel to his apartment along with Deborah’s two grandsons. Deborah assures Rebecca that she...
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Rebecca describes Zakariyya’s tiny apartment, in which he’s hung pictures of Henrietta and Elsie. He expresses a belief...
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Chapter 31: Hela, Goddess of Death
The day after meeting with Zakariyya, Deborah receives a mysterious call telling her not to trust any white people asking about...
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Chapter 32: “All That’s My Mother”
...that Rebecca is being paid by Hopkins). On May 11, 2001, Rebecca escorts Deborah and Zakariyya to Johns Hopkins. They pass the statue ofJesus and head towards Christoph Lengauer’slab. An amiable...
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...to an incubator where HeLa cells are growing. Using a microscope, Christoph allows Deborah and Zakariyya to look at their mother’s cells multiplying, before explaining basic cell biology to the two....
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...shocked Deborah that he believes Henrietta’s story is deeply important, and adds that he understands Zakariyya’sanger. He asserts that the family should get money from HeLa-fueled research. When they leave, Zakariyya...
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Chapter 38: The Long Road to Clover
After the baptism, “not much changed for the Lackses.” Lawrence and Zakariyya occasionally think about suing Johns Hopkins, Sonny has a quintuple bypass and ends up hundreds...
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