Essay on Toni Morrison's Sula - Character of Sula as a Rose

In her novel Beloved, Toni Morrison spins an intricate web between names and numbers for the reader to unravel. The deep connection that lies between names and numbers is a direct correspondence to the identity and worth of black people during slavery. Beloved begins with the identity of the house which is characterized by a number. The house is given a temperament as if it is a living, breathing entity and yet it still referred to as a number. The significance of this is symbolic to the plight of the black slaves. Regarded as little above the common animal, slaves were defined by their selling price, essentially they were reduced to a number. Viewed as nonbeings they nevertheless feel and suffer their place in the south. The character Beloved is similar in this regard as well. All that defines her is an age and a name that remains unfluctuating through time. In an insufferable and cruel world, names and numbers play a critical role in understanding the identity of black existence in the South. To uncover the implications and nuances that names and numbers play will be instrumental to delving into the lives of black slaves. Beloved contains a vast amount of names and numbers and the connections between them deepen the novel and provide mammoth insight into understanding and interpreting Morrison’s work and purpose for juxtaposing such elaborate bonds between names and numbers.

Rose is unable to fully accept herself or the statements made by her mother throughout the chapter, until she reflects back on her relationship and realizes how her mother predicted this by the condition of the garden taken care of by her husband. She understands her mother finally and stands up to Ted, explaining to him how she was going to fight for everything in the divorce.

Often in nature organisms rely on one another to survive. Relationships in which each partner gives equally are called symbiotic. The two partners live harmoniously along side one another depending on each other but still have the ability to stand and act alone should they need to. However, these perfect relationships do not always exist. Sometimes, certain organisms take more than they give and as a result the other organism suffers. Those that do this are called parasites. In Toni Morrison's novel, Sula, Sula Peace and Nel Wright demonstrate a symbiotic relationship gone awry. The two start off learning from each other and giving to each other equally, but as they spend more time together Sula seems to thrive and Nel seems to

Only two characters, Nel and Shadrack, maintain a static interpretation of Sula’s birthmark, revealing their alienation from society at large. Nel’s unchanging perception of Sula’s birthmark as a stemmed rose highlights her own need for consistency.

“Pearl, seeing the rose-bushes, began to cry for a red rose, and would not be pacified,” (73) is what is depicted once Pearl’s eyes lock with the delicate petals. Pearl screams out when her mother denies her the opportunity to go and pluck the rose, a scene that shows readers the connection Pearl has to nature. Facing scrutiny at the hands of the community on a daily basis, Pearl is drawn to the rose and nature as a whole because it is the only element in the world she lives in that does not rebuke her existence. Planted and rooted within the soil, the rosebush is a symbol of purity and the natural world, an environment Pearl longs to be

Some promiscuous women in Sula do not have families to take care of. Instead, they roam around Medallion introducing themselves to the men in town. They take what they want from the men in return for sexual favors. After receiving what they came for, promiscuous women move on. This process leads a loose woman to effectively seduce husbands. The husband then becomes intrigued by this mysterious woman. They stray from home to discover more about this woman. Once a promiscuous woman receives all that she could want from the husband she returns him home. As Ogunyemi noted, “The fact that she severs all ties with men the men whom she has communed drives them closer to their wives,” (130). Sula did not want a husband or to break up a family home. Sula’s encounters with the husbands of Medallion were described as a one night stand. Sula’s sporadic actions encouraged husbands to return home to their wife.

Toni Morrison’s Pulitzer Prize winning book Beloved, is a historical novel that serves as a memorial for those who died during the perils of slavery. The novel serves as a voice that speaks for the silenced reality of slavery for both men and women. Morrison in this novel gives a voice to those who were denied one, in particular African American women. It is a novel that rediscovers the African American experience. The novel undermines the conventional idea of a story’s time scheme. Instead, Morrison combines the past and the present together. The book is set up as a circling of memories of the past, which continuously reoccur in the book. The past is embedded in the present, and the present has no

As she was a young girl, she did not notice the changes in her surroundings, and what was happening in the war, costed Rose her life. As an innocent child, she never noticed the signs posted on the walls, about the Holocaust, or never noticed the trucks that were filled with Jews. She only focused on simple things, such as the color of the river, and a young boy. Although, through the story, Rose's personality changes. Towards the end, Rose starts to notice the problems around her town, including finding a group of Jewish prisoners in a concentration camp. Finding this area, she consistently comes back, yet this act ends up getting her killed. Conclusively, Rose Blanche's curiosity ended up getting her killed in a war tragedy. Although she was a sweet child, her actions had benefited her in a negative

In her book Sula, Toni Morrison creates a parallel between good and evil through her use of symbolism and syntax. Coinciding with her abundance of symbolism, she often times uses birds to allow her readers to know when evil is present within her novel. Usually associated with happiness and rebirth, Morrison instead chooses to details birds as portents of death or wickedness within the Bottom. This parallel between the freedom and joy of a bird and the haunting imminence of death ultimately diminishes the severity of each calamity.

While society's view of evil is really based on the disapproval of anything that would break down way society works, Sula's view of evil is based on a different goal and she acts according to a different set of standards. In other words, "Sula was distinctly different" (118). Sula "had been looking all along for a friend" (122) and that is the goal she is really trying to reach. In sleeping with many men, she is sort of looking for a release for her "misery and...deep sorrow" (122). She is trying to find a friend who she can

The book Sula by Toni Morrison is regarded as one of Morrison’s best work because of the content and structure of the book. Shadrack is an important character in the novel although his appearance in the plot is fairly brief. His significance in the novel stems from the fact that he represents one of the recurring themes of the novel, which is the need for order. Since the need to order and focus experience is an important theme, the character Shadrack illustrates the terror of chaos through his self-proclaimed day “National Suicide Day” in his small town, which portrays the importance of fear, chaos, and death in the book Sula by Toni Morrison.

Besides the story’s other symbols, the “rose” itself is the most important symbol and the title of the story is not coincidence. It is not suggest just a rose flower, but rather a symbol of the Homer and the father's love for her, town's love and admiration for her, and also foreshadows her eventual destruction. The rose in the title symbolizes the absent of love which is a

In the novel Sula, by Toni Morrison we follow the life of Sula Peace through out her childhood in the twenties until her death in 1941. The novel surrounds the black community in Medallion, specifically "the bottom". By reading the story of Sula’s life, and the life of the community in the bottom, Morrison shows us the important ways in which families and communities can shape a child’s identity. Sula not only portrays the way children are shaped, but also the way that a community receives an adult who challenges the very environment that molded them. Sula’s actions and much of her personality is a direct result of her childhood in the bottom. Sula’s identity contains many elements of a strong, independent feminist

Even though the rose is distinctly only in the title, it emerges as allegorical and symbolic throughout the story. Getty states, “The "Rose" of the title extends far beyond any one flower or literary allusion in its implications for the story's structure. The "Rose" represents secrecy: the confidential relationship between the author and his character, with all of the privileged information withheld” (Getty 230). The view of the warmth of love and fondness is to be thought when

In an effort to explain the impact of colorism in black communities, Rita B. Dandridge once stated, “In African American culture, class bias is the handmaiden of intraracial prejudice that privileges the near-white or light-complexioned person over the darker-hued.” These privileges include more desirable jobs, houses in more prestigious neighborhoods, and better educational opportunities based on one having a lighter skin complexion. Since whites have more privileges in society simply based on the color of their skin, it is common for blacks to want to be white or be able to at least pass as white. In the short story, “Sweetness” by the author Toni Morrison, the character Sweetness faces the struggles of raising a dark skin girl during