Guitar In Milkman's Song Of Solomon

The African American families in Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon present abnormality and dysfunction. Normalcy, seen in common nuclear families, is absent. The protagonist, Milkman, is shaped by his dysfunctional relationships with parental figures.

Smith is different from Milkman because of his intention of death, he wants to die to better the rest of the world and apologizes for his sins. It is revealed later that Smith was part of the seven days group, a group oriented towards revenge for black death at the hands of white people. Smith is ridden with guilt for the lives he has taken and he realizes that he has done nothing to advance blackness, he is even retreating from his efforts. Death for Milkman is a chance for something substantial to happen or change in his life, he seems indifferent to whether he lives or dies because he is so incredibly bored by life and problems that others are concerned about. Hagar is on a mission to seemingly kill Milkman, she breaks into the house but Milkman “lay there as still as the morning light, and sucked the world’s energy up into his own will.

In the novel “Song of Solomon”, Milkman’s name and nickname both hold a great significance. Milkman’s given name is Macon Dead III, however developed and lives by the name “Milkman”. Macon Dead III has developed into a kind of unfortunate legacy. Macon Dead II did not grow up with a father figure, therefore he did not understand how much importance and responsibility is held when fulfilling the role in fatherhood. Due to this inconvenience Macon Dead II was distant from Milkman, he is left retracing his father's steps.

Guitar’s sensitive character as an adolescent transformed into a violent killer as an adult because he lets racism take over his rational thoughts and develop his permanent negative behavior. His involvement of the Seven Days causes him to take direct action after the church bombing. He seeks revenge for the victims by attempting to kill four white young girls by bombing them. His obsession with gaining revenge about racism causes him to become a killer. "Four little colored girls had been blown out of a church, and his mission was to approximate as best he could a similar death of four little white girls some Sunday, since he was the Sunday man" (173). Guitar is so focused on gaining revenge on whites for the black killings so he fails to

In Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon, Macon Dead struggles with the memory of losing his father over property disputes, altering his future values and negatively affecting the lives and confidence of his family. Macon Dead grew up on a farm with his sister and father. His father was the ultimate role model, a proud and respected man who owned a large sum of land. He received his name from a white registrator who messed up his form, which highlights the powerlessness of black men around this time. Macon reflects on his early childhood when talking to Milkman: “I worked alongside my father.

In the novel Song of Solomon, a central motif of flight was dominant throughout the entire book. Song of Solomon starts off the first scene of the book with a man surrounded by an audience who are watching him decide whether or not he is going to jump off the roof of a building. The man that was on top of the building was Robert Smith. It is never said in the book, but it can be assumed that Robert Smith was one of the Seven Days men. The Seven Days is a group of black men who respond to a person of color getting killed by a white person by taking seven days to kill one white person for every person of color that is killed. Smith’s attempt to jump off of the building seemed like he actually believed that he could physically fly, even though he ended up just falling to his death. The theme of flight was mentioned countless times throughout the rest of the novel, and even in the last scene of the novel, when Milkman “takes flight” for the first and last time, multiple physical references to flight are mentioned. The central idea of flight is what the book centers around and flight helps create a journey that is full of personal growth and reflection for the main character Milkman. The countless references about flight, and a link between self acceptance and naming in the book create the build up that leads to Milkman’s “flight” at the end of the book.

Guitar Bains has been Milkman's best friend since they were children. The two share many memories and through them developed a strong bond. As Guitar and

Milkman is about to leave his family behind when Macon Jr. informs him of a green bag in Pilate’s home that is full of gold. Milkman and his best friend Guitar Bains go to Pilate’s house to steal the gold so he and his father can become wealthy. Guitar can be described as an extremist and is part of the Seven Days organization. When an African American in the community is murdered, members of the Seven Days retaliate by putting a white person to death the same way the African American was murdered. As Guitar’s grandmother said to him, “A nigger in business is a terrible thing to see. A terrible, terrible thing to see.” (Morrison 22). This was intended towards Milkman’s father and what type of a business man he was; always being selfish and greedy for wealth. This is how Milkman realizes how his race plays a role in society. Pilate is Milkman’s aunt who treats him as her own son and is protective over him. Unfortunately for Milkman and Guitar, they did not find gold but they found Milkman’s grandfather’s bones. This triggers Milkman and he finally leaves his home in search for gold in an old Pennsylvania farm.

In the Song of Solomon, Guitars betrayal to Milkman is caused due to his desire to fulfill his Seven Day’s Objective. As Milkman goes on his quest to find more information about his family history, he encounters Guitar several times. Guitar thinks that Milkman took the gold for himself rather than sharing it. Guitar is in need of the money so he would be able to purchase explosives for his mission of vengeance. His hunger for money has led him to go to the extent of killing Milkman. When Milkman goes hunting, Guitar chokes Milkman with a wire while he is alone in the woods, but manages to survive. His need for money is reinforced because of what he believes to be “Milkman’s betrayal” towards him.

“The fathers may soar and the children may know their names.” This was the basis of Milkman’s discovery of his past, which he would learn about in time. In Toni Morrison’s novel Song of Solomon, Milkman goes through the early, adolescent, and middle stages of his life with little faith in himself, for he cannot fly, nor does he know flight’s true meaning. Milkman journeys through his life being selfish and vain because he has yet to discover his true identity. As Milkman grows, the more he experiences and encounters alone and with others. Not every experience he obtains is weighted with the same significance as others, but each helps progress him through his self-discovery to find his own way of flight. As Milkman discovers the past about

The abandonment and betrayal of women has been seen throughout history and novels, including Song of Solomon, by Toni Morrison. Morrison uses the relationship of Macon Dead II and Ruth to express this in her book. Morrison also expresses how women are to reliant on their men for support, she uses Pilate to show this. Macon Dead II and Ruth are married and the parents of Milkman, the protagonist of the novel. The novel starts out in 1931, the birth of Milkman and narrates his life till about 1962. They are a middle to lower class African American family living in Michigan. The theme abandonment of women is shown through the relationship of Macon Dead II and

Song of Solomon, by Toni Morrison, is about a man named Macon Dead. Throughout this novel, however, he is known by all except his father as Milkman because his mother breastfed him until he was in his teens. The novel centers on Milkman's attempt to find himself. His family is a wealthy black family living in a poor black neighborhood, where Milkman's father prohibits Milkman from interacting with most of them, including his aunt. However, he ends up visiting her, and while there, he learns a little about his family's mysterious past and decides to look deeper into it. Throughout his journey into his past, one may notice a large amount of biblical allusions.

“Doing the right thing takes courage and strength.” (Blair Waldorf). Some people have struggles growing up and cannot express who they truly are because they always tried to hide under someone’s shadow. Throughout the first half of the novel Milkman is the incarnation of an immature young man drifting aimlessly through life. He also inherited some qualities from his father; they both had strong materialistic values, arrogance, his sexist, and aggressive attitude towards women. In Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison uses minor characters in the novel as form of guidance counselor for Milkman’s development.

   Song of Solomon tells the story of Dead's unwitting search for identity. Milkman appears to be destined for a life of self-alienation and isolation because of his commitment to the materialism and the linear conception of time that are part of the legacy he receives from his father, Macon Dead. However, during a trip to his ancestral home, “Milkman comes to understand his place in a cultural and familial community and to appreciate the value of conceiving of time as a cyclical process”(Smith 58).

It can be said that Song of Solomon is bildungsroman which is defined by The Encyclopedia Britannica as “a class of novel that deals with the [coming-of-age or] formative years of an individual”. Furthermore, in a bildungsroman, a main protagonist usually undergoes some transformation after seeking truth or philosophical enlightenment. In Morrison’s novel, the plot follows the main protagonist Milkman as he matures within his community while developing relationships with others and discovering his individual identity. In an essay titled Call and Response, Marilyn Sanders Mobley notes that “What Song of Solomon does ultimately is suggest that a viable sense of African American identity comes from responding to alternative constructions of