Song Of Solomon Allusions

"I wouldn't let him see me cry, I was so enraged. He used a foot ruler, and when I jerked my smarting palms back, he made me hold them out again. He looked at my dry eyes in a kind of fury, as though he'd failed unless he drew water from them." (Page 9) Hagar's father straps her hands with a ruler but even as a child, she will not let her tears be seen, she will not let him see that he is hurting her. Even when her brother Dan is near death, she will not comfort him, for it requires that she act as their mother, which to her is despicable. "But all I could think of was that meek woman I'd never seen, the woman Dan was said to resemble so much an from whom he'd inherited a frailty I could not help but detest, however much a part of me wanted to sympathize." Hagar cannot bear the thought of pretending to be someone as feeble and weak as their mother. Throughout her marriage, Hagar never lets Bram know that she enjoyed their lovemaking. "He never knew. I never let him know, it was all inner. (Page 81) When Hagar's husband Bram dies she does not shed a tear, not even when there is only her son to witness it. "But when we'd buried Bram and come home again and lighted lamps for the evening, it was John who cried, not I." (Page 184) Still, when her son John dies she does not weep, as if she had been born without tear ducts. "The night my son died I was

She relies on her materialistic tendencies to make her beautiful. However, they result in nothing but disappointment. After seeing herself in the compact given to her by Pilate, Hagar exclaims “Look at how I look. I look awful. No wonder he didn’t want me.

In "Song of Solomon", the setting is used to "Accentuate qualities of a character", or in this case, Milkman. The setting takes place during the 1900's while African Americans were struggling to fight for their rights as citizens. Milkman was a child of Macon Jr. born in a wealthy household in the North. Due to racisim, Macon Jr.'s father was killed by white men, which lead him to a life of Greed and selfishness. The wealthy household that was controled by Macon Jr., in which the house Milkman was rasied in, turned Milkman selfish and ignorant. Later, Milkman journeys to find wealth, thinking that it is the fulfillment of his life. Soon he travels to Shalimar (Located in the South), there he learns his ancestors history and realizes the error

Song of Solomon, written by Toni Morrison, is a magical realism novel that takes place in the 1940s, before the Civil Rights movement. The novel is about the life of a boy named Macon Dead III, who soon acquired the nickname Milkman. He struggles with figuring out who he is and being independent. But once he learns about his family’s roots, he slowly starts to move away from his family’s reach. Morrison argues that knowing where one comes from helps one build independence and establish an individual’s identity.

From the novel, Song of Solomon, the seemingly opposite mothers Ruth and Pilate go through marital problems, being shunned, trying pregnancies, and family members’ deaths. It is easy to feel sympathy towards these women because it seems they are subject to invisibility. The way they are portrayed leaves an impression on the reader and influences the way they feel about the character. Toni Morrison depicts Ruth through her lack of exposure, helpless marriage, and the lack of connection with her son, Milkman. By representing her in these ways it seems that Morrison is coercing readers to sympathize more with Ruth.

It’s not even day back in Hagar times that a slave decided to liberate herself from her family. Hagar was just an inmost virgin slave that was oppressed by her owner Sarai. The owner used Hagar for her benefits but did not think about the repercussions. If a woman was unable to provide children for her husband, she was seen as worthless. Therefore, since Sarai had fertility problems she decided to give her slave to her

Reba: Pilate's daughter and Hagar's mother. Has problems with men since she has fantastic luck when it comes to winning but when it comes to winning men's hearts she never wins. Does whatever it takes to make Hagar happy.

Hagar can not find her own sense of self-love, causing her to self-worth through tangible items, which lead to her death. Hagar’s breakup with Milkman leaves her feeling worthless

How do the two Hagars resemble each other? Both women hold relatively similar social positions. The Biblical Hagar is an Egyptian bondwoman bought as a servant for Sarah, Abram's wife. Hagar, by law, is bound to Sarah. Her freedom and spirit are restricted, or dictated, by Abram and Sarah. This ownership extends as far as Abram having possession of Hagar's body. When Sarah does not or cannot give Abram a child, Hagar is expected to do so. Dutifully, she bears him a son named Ishmael.

She expresses herself in ways that are more destructive. Violence is the outlet Hagar sees in expressing herself. Her “graveyard love” for Milkman initially mutes her voice (148). His goodbye letter “sent Hagar spinning into a bright blue place where the air was thin and it was silent all the time, and where people spoke in whispers or did not make sounds at all, and where everything was frozen except for an occasional burst of fire inside her chest” (116). Hagar is hardly aware of her own emotions and finds it impossible for her to tell Milkman how she feels because she has no identity. Instead, Hagar turns to physical violence. She was a “doormat wom[a]n” that “wanted to kill for love, die for love” (336). When she tries to kill Milkman, she finds herself “paralyzed” by her obsessive love for him (150). Like Ryna, her love left her. When Milkman left and “dreamt of flying, Hagar was dying” (363). Hagar’s extreme obsession ultimately turns self-destructive and assists to the cause of her death. She spends her last hours in a frantic search for clothes and cosmetics that will make Milkman love her again. She dies convinced that “he loves silky hair . . . penny-colored hair . . . and lemon-colored skin . . . and gray-blue eyes” unlike her own (346). To Hagar, her African-American race and body are worthless if they do not attract Milkman; she was trying to create “this ideal of beauty” that she could never have (Pereira). Hagar’s dependence on Milkman and

Hagar after knowing that she isn't love back led her to murder Milkman. When Milkman got tired of Hagar, who was not caring about him that much till then, started to have interest in him. As soon as she realize that she couldn’t get the love back from him, she tried to kill him. She tried to attempt the murder for “six times in as many months”(130), each time with different weapons but failed, but she would not give up because she didn't want him to leave her. Murder was the way that Hagar showed her affection toward Milkman because “He’s the one who’s tryin to take himself out of her life. And she’ll kill him before she lets him do that”(139) states the nature of loving that one will kill others to get love. In this case, Hagar tried to kill him because he is the one who is trying to leave her and only way she knew how to stop it was to kill him since she can't control his feeling toward her. Her

Besides the children of Macon Dead, there are other biblical allusions in the names of people. One of these is Hagar, Pilate's son and Milkman's cousin. Though the biblical Hagar is not well known, her character in the Bible reflects, in some ways, the character in Morrison's novel. In the bible, Hagar is Sarah's handmaiden. When she bares the son

   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

As Hagar’s love for Milkman grows more and more obsessive, Morrison reveals the bitter consequences of life as a woman seeking intimacy in a strictly patriarchal world. In the beginning of the novel, Hagar is associated primarily with her female relatives, Reba and Pilate. Even then, well-fed Hagar declares, “Some of my days were hungry