The Tenacity of the African American Woman:

A Comparison of Toni Morrison’s Sula and Song of Solomon

by Jeremiah Moore

Introduction

            Culture is defined in numerous ways. The word’s most respected definition is from Webster’s dictionary: “The customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group.” Everyone has his/her own culture to identify with. Asian, Latin-American, Jamaican, and African-American are some, not all, that are seen in today’s society. Through art, narratives especially, a culture can be explored. To explore my African-American culture, I read novels penned by world renowned African-American novelists. Ralph Ellison, Langston Hughes, Zora Neal Hurston, Alice Walker, and Toni Morrison are a few of the many poets and authors that paint the mural of African-American culture. Journalist, Rachel Ghansah feels, “they were not just producing poems, plays and novels, they were also considering the obligations of their specific genre — black literature — and its defining aspects and distinct functions” (Ghansah). Though the struggle of societal acceptance has been ongoing for the entire community, the stories derived from these greats fight the stigmatic stereotypes of being African-American. The stories from Toni Morrison, in particular, fights the stereotypes of being a woman – an African-American woman.

The representation of African-American culture is easily seen while reading any of the twelve novels penned by Toni Morrison. Though they differ in timeframes and concepts, within the first chapter of each novel, the reader will notice some collective hints of family, affection, devotion, or trial & error. Each theme mentioned boomerangs back to a core element – love. African-American women are, at times, portrayed as if they have no sense of love, but Morrison snatches that perception away from each reader. The love is not only within the dialogue of the characters, but it is also seen by the inclusion of certain descriptive actions, items, and the uniquely memorable settings she invents.

“The [setting of the] Bottom [in Sula] is full of life -- shaped, to be sure, in great measure by white bigotry and discrimination, but also by its own culture and sustained by its own institutions…the most fully realized character in the novel . . . is the community of the Bottom” (Yardley).

A woman’s life is not as easy to live as it may look. She is facing self-identification, stereotypes, and a constant political, financial, and environmental power struggle. There is research showing women reacting to these issues, yet the issues are still being protested. They are swept underneath the United States’ red, white, and blue rug. Also, the studies are usually conducted by individuals of a different race, ethnicity, or culture than African-American. The results from the women are collected, but due to the research population lacking diversity, the results will only express the voice of one classification of the women – not every woman equally.

Women of color face the same issues of any other woman, but their melanin play a major part in how the dealer distributes their cards. The “race card” is used against them in more ways than one, but it, and the other issues, can not hold them back from becoming one with themselves. Two novels that illustrate this respectfully are Toni Morrison’s Sula and Song of Solomon. With the novels and scholarly articles researched, this read will explore and compare the relation of the main women characters of each novel to real life instances.

Review of Scholarship

 Born Chloe Anthony Wofford on February 18, 1931, Morrison was introduced to reading, music, and folktales by her parents. With a welder as a father and a domestic worker as a mother, her family was economically stable enough to live in an integrated suburb of Lorain, Ohio. She interacted with white individuals so often, she knew nothing about racism until her teenage years. The inequality she witnessed inspired her to write about it. While attending Howard University, she set a goal of becoming a professional writer. Her first novel was published in 1970, instantly giving Morrison the foundation for building cultural brilliance (biography.com).   

The only living American laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature is well known in the African-American literature community. Her objective is to have every reader hear her messages. She wants everyone to actually take a ride with her from the opening page to the final sentence. She is great at making it happen, but journalist Bill Moyers feels that the only way she can do it is by placing “blacks” on a center stage: “I don’t mean this to be a trick question, it just occurs to me, though, is it conceivable that you could write a novel in which blacks are not center stage?” (Moyers). She answers yes to the question, but the deletion of how white people look at African-Americans, or the “white gaze,” is what Morrison actually does within her novels. She is a master at disregarding the stereotypes of her culture while creating masterpieces for everyone:

“That was the liberation for me. It has nothing to do with who reads the books -- everyone, I hope, of any race, any gender, any country. But my sovereignty and my authority as a racialized person had to be struck immediately with the very first book” (“Toni Morrison Interview (1998)” 00:30:39-59).

Stanley Crouch, a paradoxical journalist, thinks Morrison’s writing is talented, but “she needs a new subject matter, the world she lives in, not this world of endless black victims” (TIME, pp. 2). Though her works are of fiction, pure imaginary creations, Crouch feels her subject matters are not adequate. Literature is used to take readers on excursions, and Morrison’s work does just that. With his controversial views on many other forms of cultural art, I am not surprised, or pleased, by his criticism. Yet, his criticism is not the only of its kind.

Although Morrison is an essayist, editor, honorable professor, and an award-winning novelist, the questions that stem from her material are more so philosophical, political, or sociological than they are literary. Novels are created to make the reader think, but if the reader questions the author’s ability to write the novel, instead of the author’s grammar, syntax, or choice of an idiotic ending even, then is the thinking of that reader besmirched? I believe so.

“Often, in black literature, it seems as though the author is performing two roles: that of the explorer and the explainer. Morrison does not do this” (Ghansah). Morrison’s novels are still surfacing today due to their deciphering of the African-American community. Rachel Ghansah says the novelist’s catalog of work “creates an empirical understanding of Black life in America.” She does not place blacks on a pedestal, but expresses how it is not a crime to be African-American. Normalization of the culture and race is what she is doing through her novels. Each one tells the reader, “this is how we pray, this is how we escape, this is how we hurt, this is how we repent, [and] this is how we move on” (Ghansah).  

Toni Morrison’s support from her fellow writers is remarkable. Maya Angelou, Nikky Fenny, Sonia Sanchez, June Jordan, Houston A. Baker, Jr., Thulani Davis, Alice Walker, and a plethora of other righteous creators of color writes a letter to Toni Morrison prior to her receiving the Pulitzer Prize in Literature in 1988 for Beloved:

“The legitimate need for our own critical voice in relation to our own literature can no longer be denied. We, therefore, urgently affirm our rightful and positive authority in the realm of American letters and, in this prideful context, we do raise this tribute to the author of ''The Bluest Eye,'' ''Sula,'' ''Song of Solomon,'' ''Tar Baby'' and ''Beloved'':

Alive, we write this testament of thanks to you, dear Toni: alive, beloved and persevering, magical. Among the fecund intimacies of our hidden past, and among the coming days of dream or nightmares that will follow from the bidden knowledge of our conscious heart, we find your life work ever building to a monument of vision and discovery and trust. You have never turned away the searching eye, the listening ear attuned to horror or to histories providing for our faith. And freely you have given to us every word that you have found important to the forward movement of our literature, our life. For all of America, for all of American letters, you have advanced the moral and artistic standards by which we must measure the daring and the love of our national imagination and our collective intelligence as a people” (Conrad).

            According to Paul Gray, reading a Morrison “novel is to be pulled into a passionate, contentious and sometimes violent world and to confront questions as old as human civilization itself.” Although every individual does not want to understand her themes, her ability to produce mind tugging art is not up for debate. Her lyricism is outrageously over looked at times. With over 1 million novels sold, a movie transcribed, Beloved, and many other accolades, who can Morrison be compared to? “…For her ability to turn the mundane into the magical…Morrison looks to be a lot closer to William Faulkner, whom many critics regard as this century's greatest American novelist…” (TIME, pp. 2). Toni Morrison is one of the greatest American novelists. African-American culture would never be what it is without her novels.

Introduction of the Novels

            Sula is a great portrayal of the African-American woman. Based around two female friends who have known each other since childhood, it decapitates the stereotypical housewife. One of the women is fearless, while the other is hesitant. Though they are raised in different environments, they encounter many life changing activities together. Song of Solomon is based on the character Macon “Milk Man” Dead, Jr, but his aunt, Pilate, and estranged ex-girlfriend, Hagar, are two women that stand out tremendously. The two are grandmother and granddaughter, but have two different personalities. Pilate is strong and independent, like Sula of Sula, while Hagar is a hopeless romantic. Each woman must understand how to truly accept herself; a characteristic some women have yet to embody. 

Sula

The ideal woman is spoken of in novels, but with Sula, Toni Morrison lets her readers know that being extraordinary is alright. They will see that living life with no regrets can bring pure joy and freedom. Written in 1973, the women in this novel are different yet very similar. Sula, Nel, and Ms. Eva are remarkably correlated due to the different routes they take leading to the same destination – internal peace within the city of The Bottom.

Sula

An enchanted rose is how readers describe the title character of the novel, Sula Peace. As a young girl, she is not afraid to experiment with anything. The label fearless is an understatement, “she is a pioneer seeking her true self by revolting against double discrimination and oppression” (AN Guiqin, pp. 118). The only things she yearns for are true love and happiness. Nel, her best friend, fills the voids until the two of them reach adulthood. That is when certain feelings decimate for Sula and her self-identity becomes stronger.   

Sula does not perform the typical womanized duties: cooking, cleaning, carrying children, and everything in between. She cooks and cleans only when she wants. The only time she connects with a man is when she is in need of his penile functions. Someone’s husband or not, after she is finished with him, he is kicked out of the door. “She is not ruthless; rather, she is spontaneous and unable to moderate or temper the sudden impact her actions might have on her community” (AN Guiqin, pp.116). Ninety-percent of the women of the town envies Sula respectively. They identify her as a threat due to her courage and determination. The abundance of self-confidence and power embodied by her is wished for by each of them. Every wife and mother sees Sula and, unintentionally, begin to recognize where she is slacking within her own marriage or relationship with her children. A walking handgun ready to blow is a way people see the African-American woman, and Sula is a true example of that.

Nel

 “[She] admirably performs all of the obligatory roles: dutiful friend, respectful daughter, loyal wife, and nurturing mother” (Bergenholtz, pp. 92). While Sula is a full throttle, go-getter, her best friend is not. Elegant or peaceful is how one can describe Nel. Unconditional love from her mother and a first-class train ticket is what she is accustomed to. Her mother set rules and tries to keep her away from the realities of life. She especially tries to keep her away from Sula, to no prevail.

The two of them gets into a lot of things: the death of Chicken Little (Sula, pp. 170), fighting off bullies, and many other sticky situations. Each of the adventures shape Nel into the superb woman she becomes. She is content with the same daily schedule, until Sula arrives back in town from her hiatus. Instead of walking to her own beat, Nel needs someone to play an instrument for her. With her best friend’s instrumental so ear tugging, she continues to use hers. Nel looks up to Sula and tries to build an identity for herself while doing so.

Eva

Eva Peace is known as the mother of everyone: the neighbor’s children, Sula, Hannah, Plum, The Deweys, Nel, and any random children walking by. In the novel, she protects her children with everything she has, including her own body. Eva’s leg gets amputated in a train accident. She receives a settlement for it that aids her in moving her family into a bigger home. Her husband, Boy Boy Peace, leaves her and the children without anything but “$1.65 and 5 eggs…” (Sula, pp. 32), so she is now financially stable.

With the ability to control her emotions and end her children’s pain, readers will see her as strong-willed woman. For example, her “euthanasia” of her son Plum. Instead of continuously give him medications, she pours gasoline on him and light a match ending his life (pp. 47-48). With Hannah, she falls out of the window in hopes of extinguishing the flames her daughter is engulfed in (pp.77-78). A woman as such is still no match for Sula Peace.

After reconnecting with her granddaughter, Eva is placed in a nursing home. The entire town is outraged by it. Although no one from the community assists Eva with her household duties, they feel Sula can take care of her. Family is to take care of family, and letting Eva go into a nursing home is equivalent to letting someone put her outdoors. “If you are put out, you go somewhere else; if you are put outdoors, there is no place to go” (The Bluest Eye, pp. 17). Sula is the dominate woman in the novel, but in the midst of the craziness, each woman is prosperous with connecting deeper to themselves.

Song of Solomon

            “It was becoming a habit – this concentration on things behind him. Almost as though there were no future to be had” (Song of Solomon, pp. 35). This quote speaks about the ability to let go of the past, something people lack. Milk Man, the main character of the novel Song of Solomon, is one of those people. He is connected deeply to two African-American women: Pilate and Hagar. Pilate has that ability, but like Milk Man, Hagar has yet to obtain it.

Pilate

With her name, “the piece of paper her dad wrote it down on, inside of her brass box on her earring” (pp. 53), the reader will understand she has priceless nuances and solidifies individuality. She is there for Milk Man’s birth, but a disconnection between her and her brother leads to them not interacting until his best friend, Guitar, introduces them to each other. “Milk Man took a breath, held it, and said ‘hi” (pp. 37). Still, he does not understand the great significance she is to his life until she tells him. That conversation does not occur until she feels the time is right. Timing is everything within this novel, and Pilate does not miss a beat.

            With the drive and fearlessness, I feel Pilate relates to Sula. Although she is extremely petite while Sula is a full figured, Coca-Cola bottle shape, they both are women that do not take anything from anyone. For example, her brother, Macon Dead, holds a grudge against her over finances, and instead of fight with him, she moves on the other side of town. Pilate asks him, “What harm did I do you on my knees?” (pp. 126), but his answer is elliptic. Pilate is full of generational stories and family truths, something other characters within the novel lacks. That is the reason Milk Man’s dad tries his best to keep him away from her, to no prevail.

            Milk Man and Guitar tries to rob her of some family heirlooms, but instead of kill them, as she intended, she lets them go. Well, she lets Guitar go and keeps Milk Man behind, to inform him as to who she really is. Understanding his pain about his father, she “made him feel tall too” (pp. 50). It is another example of her being able to forgive people. She tries to look at the bright side of a lot of situations, but do not underestimate her. Her family is not to be fucked with – by anybody.

            Pilate’s daughter, Reba, has an abusive boyfriend. He tries to punch her while Pilate is in the house minding her business, but once he lands his hit, their business turns into her business. Without hesitation, she points a knife to Reba’s boyfriend’s neck and applies pressure (pp. 93). She does not kill him. She tells him to get out and to never return. A woman of her size is usually seen as weak, but Pilate graciously shows each reader otherwise.

Hagar

            Infatuated with the feeling of completeness, Hagar yearns for the love of Milk Man. Strangely similar to Nel’s feelings of Sula, the affection he gives her is unmatched by any other person she encounters. After teasing him for years, she finally lets him inside of her. With sex being the topic of discussion every time the two of them speak, Milk Man starts to lose the passion he once felt for her. Although she has his heart, once he starts to question his existence, the level of maturity he needs is not found in her anymore. Kisses, time, and sex is what she wish for from him. There is much more to life than that, and since she does not want him to embark on his journey of evolvement, she is no longer his match made in heaven.

Acceptance is one thing she struggles with throughout the entire novel. Unlike Pilate, Hagar is hard with forgiving. After making love one last time, he goes on a hiatus. Desperately looking for himself, he pens a break up letter and addresses it to her. Her heart shattering with every word read, she painfully wants him. Sula may have checked him off of her list of men, but Hagar is not that brusque. “A dead man ain’t no man. A dead man is a corpse” (pp. 80). Once Milk Man leaves Hagar’s life, she loses sight of anything else happening in the world. She does not move on and let go. She evokes to me the phrase “if I can’t have you, nobody can” due to her dedicating her life to seeing him dead.    

The ability to move on is a trait every woman character in the novels share, except for Hagar. Life is meant to be lived, and although it takes Nel nearly thirty years to realize it, she does. Self-identification is stressful, but as a person dedicated to progressing within this cold-cruel world, it has to be done. 

Issues of Womanhood

            Hillary Clinton is the latest woman to run for the Presidency of the United States of America and win the popular vote. Although she snatches the election by an estimated 3million votes, the Electoral College plucks her opponent and places him in power instead. That is not the only problem, she has been the First Lady of the United States twice, and a Senator of New York for eight years while her opponent has no political experience at all. Is the country still parked in a certain era? That answer can be as clear as the crystal ceiling Clinton shot so hard to break.

“April Ryan, a respected journalist with unrivaled integrity…was patronized and cut off, trying to ask a question…Maxine Waters was taunted with a racist joke about her hair. Now too many women, especially women of color, have had a life time of practice taking precisely these kinds of indignities in stride. But why should we have to?” (“Hillary Clinton on April Ryan and Maxine Waters.” 00:00:20-37, 00:00:39-59).

Although women of every race continue to obtain the short end of the stick from the societal relay, women of color, African-American in particular, has yet to gain mutual respect when touching the stick at all. African-American women are showcased less throughout the environment, the derogatory stereotypes aimed at them are monstrously above average, and the equality in the career market is becoming dehydrated.

Every woman of color does not inspire to become a video vixen or an Instagram model. Majority of them are college graduates regretting their graduation day because the accumulation of student loan debt. With the amount of women interested in becoming lawyers, politicians, and/or physicians, the fields should not want for anyone. Sadly, that is not the case. The acceptance of every eligible candidate is not what corporate America believes in. A qualified woman may be passed up for her male counterpart, simply because she is a woman. On the contrary, a qualified African-American woman may get overlooked because she happily checks the box labeling herself as “black and/or not Hispanic” on the application. There are many elements to the answers of the questions that are not yet posed about women equality. “African-American women are lazy,” can not, should not rather, be one of them!  

Yvette Bonaparte states in her study’s introduction that in “the US Equal Employment Opportunity office 2010 job patterns…African American women comprised 7.6% of all employees in the pharmaceutical industry…1.5% of senior executives and 3.4% of first/mid-level managers.” The numbers are extremely small, but the study shows that the women participants do not let them act as intimidation. Once a leadership opportunity is open, they apply, accept the offer, and continue to make change and room for the next pharmaceutical professional. They use certain strategies for “communicating and navigating within predominately white environments… to overcome negative stereotypes and barriers” (Bonaparte). Making differences, leveraging information, serving as mentors, establishing and maintaining credibility, asking for support, illustration of integrity at the highest levels, and tackling challenges are the key components of being a leader in the industry. The study includes eight African-American women that perform leadership roles at work. Each of them are masters of every component, and have no plans on decreasing the dedicational work.

Working in corporate America is tough for everyone, but much harder for women. The woman full of “Black Girl Magic; the beauty, power and resilience of black women” (Wilson) makes it look like a piece of cake. With failure not being an option, these women adapt tunnel vision and achieve every goal set. “Wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down!” (Song of Solomon, pp. 179). Though the odds are against her, the African-American woman stands tall and continues to ascend.

Conclusion

Sula and Song of Solomon are great novels that showcase the black woman in various ways. Eva is a courageous woman of freedom before she is admitted into the nursing home. She believes everyone should live his/her life happily and free with no regrets or pain. Sula is triumphant in doing whatever she please – with no regrets. While, Nel reaches an understanding of what she lacks as an individual – herself. Hagar and Pilate correlate with the three women on the same bridge of acceptance and living happily. Instead of treat Milk Man with hate out of spite, Pilate nurtures him with the same love she has for her children. Hagar, on the other hand, goes insane over his love. Her ability to accept things as they are becomes worse than ever. Her ending is a lonely death, short of like Sula’s. The will to change something that has no cognition to become anything different is a waste of energy. Being free and at peace are two major goals all of these women share. I think accepting certain things and moving forward will definitely bring eternal peace.

Today, being an adult, good wife, and loyal friend are constant struggles of too many women. Self-identity and unpolluted freedom are two others. The major themes of the novels compared are surrounding these struggles. I now understand that women of color focus more on reaching goals and knocking down doors rather than who is to blame for their inequality, although the answer can be obvious. Self-acceptance and self-righteousness are more important than what society makes them seem. With no sugar coating, Toni Morrison unravels guidebooks explaining the tenacity of African-American women. Every novel is manufactured to push each reader in the direction of his/her truth; away from the stupor of Americanized culture.

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