Sula

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The representation of death in this novel is associated with observation; for even here, when there are no witnesses to watch over the dying, the event still registers as spectacle” (186). Sula (1974) is Toni Morrison’s second published novel. Like The Bluest Eye, the novel is a story of two girls coming of age. As children, the two girls in question, Sula Peace and Nel Wright, function as two halves of a whole, often seeming to complete each other in opposition. Rekus is Sula’s father. Described as a laughing man, he dies when Sula is three years old, leaving both Hannah and Sula alone. Sula grows up without a father and this childhood loneliness provides part of the basis for her friendship with Nel. Rekus is really significant only because he is absent and therefore the Peace house is comprised mostly of women. Reverend Deal Although Sula moves between many different characters’ perspectives, it is almost entirely told from the point of view of women living in the Bottom. Often, the men in the novel can’t be “pinned down” for long: their jobs keep them away from home ( Wiley Wright), or their desire for independence leads them to abandon their families ( Jude Greene, BoyBoy, etc.). As a result, it’s no surprise that Morrison offers many insights into the lives of women and their role in their communities. Again, what strikes me is the scene’s combination of strangeness and familiarity: the weird games children play when they are outside and have no toys; the sense that as a young girl, I, too, played this way with, became one with, other young girls (whose names I know: Hilda, Chanda, Nyaka). Even the smallest details of the scene—the literal bits and pieces Sula and Nel throw in their merged hole—shudder between the random and the archetypal.

Full of beauty, eccentricity, bustle, laughter, sensuality, generous affection… Toni Morrison’s work is strikingly individual Time Literary Supplement Nel is the only character in the novel who openly admits her own shame. She feels shame when Jude leaves her. Nel feels this shame because her status as a wife and mother is destroyed. Her inability to conform to the community’s expectations causes Nel to feel ashamed. Birds and now i understand why this book kept injuring me - Sula does NOT play nice. it is a rough book full of rough things too potent to be contained between the covers of the book itself. or maybe the book was just trying to get my attention because it knew i would like it so much. either way, it was worth the price of a few battle scars marking me like sula herself, whose birthmark gives her face a broken excitement.In turn, after her marriage fails, Nel turns to her children for emotional fulfillment they cannot provide. Her children are eager to escape into adulthood, away from her needy over-attentiveness. Two girls who grow up to become women. Two friends who become something worse than enemies. Terrifying, comic and tragic, Sula overflows with love and life, friendship and betrayal. Read more Look Inside Details If I could guarantee that I could stay in this small white room with dirty tile and gurgling water in the pipes and my head on the cool rim of this bathtub without ever having to leave, I would be content. If I could guarantee that I would never have to get up to flush the toilet, enter the kitchen, see my children grow and die, or see my food eaten on my plate…” (Morrison, 1998, p. 108).

Sula is a real character, as we say. Sula is incomparable, matchless, singular. There is nobody like Sula. And yet. I’ve seen Sula in my days, in my sisters, my aunts, my friends, a stranger crossing the road. Morrison saw Sula in someone, too, before she wrote her:McDowell, Deborah E. “Boundaries: Or Distant Relations and Close Kin.” Afro-American Literary Studies in the 1990s, edited by Houston A. Baker, Jr., and Patricia Redmond. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989: 51-70. One day, Hannah tries to light a fire outside and her dress catches fire. Eva sees this happening from upstairs and jumps out the window in an attempt to save her daughter's life. Sula, who was sitting on the porch, simply watched her mother burn. An ambulance comes, but Hannah dies en route to the hospital, with Eva injured as well. Other residents of the Bottom believe Sula remained still because was stunned by the incident. Eva believes that Sula stood and watched out of curiosity.