261:, set to be bulldozed at the beginning of the novel for the creation of a golf course. The Bottom originated as an agreement between a white farmer and his Black slave. The farmer had promised freedom and a piece of valley land to his slave should he complete some difficult chores. Upon the completion of the chores the farmer regrets his end of the bargain, no longer wanting to give up the land. In order to get out of the arrangement, the farmer feigns regret to the slave over having to give him valley land rather than "Bottom" land. The farmer claimed that "Bottom" land (actually located on top of a hill) would be better than valley land because it was closer to the bottom of heaven.
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Helene Wright, who dislikes Sula's family instantly, and her inherent curiosity with the world, which she discovers on a trip. Though she vows to explore more of the world, she ultimately never leaves The Bottom again. This experience ultimately prompts Nel to begin a friendship with Sula. The Peace family is the opposite: Sula lives with her grandmother Eva and her mother Hannah, both of whom are seen by the town as eccentric, loose, yet Hannah was genuinely loved by all men, and Eva was very respected by all women. Their house serves as a home for three informally adopted boys and a steady stream of boarders. The extremely strained relationship between Hannah and Eva is revealed.
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falls into a nearby river and drowns. They do not tell anyone of their role in his death. Though Sula grieves with guilt, Nel feels relief after deciding that the event is primarily Sula's fault. Shadrack lives in a shack by the river's edge, and the girls are uncertain if he witnessed
Chicken Little's death. To determine if he saw, Sula visits the shack alone and is surprised at its orderliness. Sula is unable to confront Shadrack through her tears. He comforts her and she runs away, accidentally leaving behind her belt. Shadrack hangs the belt on his wall in memory of his only visitor.
527:, relationships between mothers and daughters do not seem to be predicated on shared affection and a duty to protect one's offspring. For example, Hannah, Sula's mother is overheard in conversation with her friends, "You love her, like I love Sula. I just don't like her. That's the difference." (57) Hannah's comment does gesture toward a sense of duty but differs from Jacobs' as it implies an absence of a desire to mother. When Hannah challenges her mother Eva about expressions of love toward her, Eva responds by reminding Hannah of the sacrifices that she has made for her.
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character subverts traditional binary oppositions, and "transcends the boundaries of social and linguistic convention." The decentering and temporal deferral of the character who lends the novel its title similarly "denies the whole notion of character as static essence, replacing it with the idea of character as process." This "complex set of dynamics" forces the reader to "fill in the gaps" as well as to "bridge the gaps separating from the text" and therefore makes them active participants in the meaning-making process.
362:: Sula's best friend (can also be considered a main protagonist) who does not want to be like her mother because she will never be reduced to "custard" and she will not be humiliated by other people as her mother is. Nel is the opposite of Sula: she decided to marry, have children and stay in the Bottom when she became an adult. She is Sula's best friend as they are children and then their relation turned into something more complex when Jude left Nel for Sula.
320:: the childhood best friend of Nel, whose return to the Bottom disrupts the whole community. The main reason for Sula's strangeness is her defiance of gender norms and traditional morality, symbolized by the birthmark "that spread from the middle of the lid toward the eyebrow, shaped something like a stemmed rose," which, according to some psychoanalytic readings, is a dual symbol with both phallic and vaginal resonance.
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326:: Sula's grandmother, who is missing one leg. Though the circumstances are never fully explained, it is suggested that she purposely put it under a train in order to collect insurance money to support her three young children after her husband left her. She has a peculiar relation with her children. She passes on to Hannah and then Sula a need for male attention.
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338:: Sula's mother; Eva's eldest daughter. She married Rekus, who died when Sula was three years old. Hannah is a promiscuous and care-free woman who later burns to death in front of her mother and daughter. Her daughter Sula witnessed the fire but did nothing, while her mother tried to save her by jumping on top of her from her bedroom window.
539:(77). Chicken died by water; Hannah died by fire. Nel watches Chicken die by drowning, according to Eva at the later scene in the nursing home (168). Sula watches Hannah die in flames (78). Both Plum and Hannah —brother and sister— die by fire (Plum is burned to death by Eva, Hannah dies from her injuries after catching fire by accident).
666:, Ferguson argues, gave black lesbian feminists "a model of alternative subjectivities". The novel became a useful tool to invent new ways of thinking. By illustrating alternative social relationships, it provided a way for women of color feminists to imagine new possibilities outside of the constraints of nationalism.
392:: three boys, each about one year apart from one another in age, who were each nicknamed "Dewey" by Eva. Their real names are never written in the novel, and after the introduction of these characters, the three were referred as one being, thus Morrison's use of a lowercase "d" in "dewey" for the rest of the novel.
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each other better. Sula's affairs give the wives a reason to soothe the bruised egos of their husbands, while Sula's lack of family at her age is scorned by all the women and causes them to be better mothers. Though
Shadrack is typically vulgar and shocking to other townspeople, he treats Sula with respect.
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demonstrates numerous doubles or parallels between the novel's characters. For example, Sula and Eva both kill men (Sula kills
Chicken Little; Eva kills Plum). The death of Chicken Little results in a closed casket funeral (64). Likewise, for Hannah, "the casket had to be kept closed at the funeral"
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Nel and Sula end their friendship after Sula has an affair with Nel's husband Jude. Just before Sula dies in 1940, they reconcile half-heartedly. With Sula's death, the harmony that had reigned in the town quickly dissolves. Sula dies alone with no one to attend her funeral. Shadrack, whose PTSD has
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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
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Nel never remarries and becomes an overbearing mother. The Bottom slowly dissolves after Sula's death, becoming a different place. Nel visits Eva in 1965 in an elderly care facility, where Eva tells her that she knew about the death of
Chicken Little. Nel replies that the blame was just on Sula but
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In "1920" and "1921," the narrator contrasts the families of the children Nel Wright and Sula Peace, who both grow up with no father figure. Nel, the product of a mother knee deep in social conventions, grows up in a stable home. Nel is initially torn between the rigid conventionality of her mother
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Sula is described as having a birthmark over one eye that darkens over the years as she matures and defies social conventions. The appearance of the birthmark is utilized to reveal how each character perceived Sula. Sula's peers interpreted the appearance of the birthmark differently: Sula's close
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The rest of the town grows to resent Sula, in part because of her many affairs with married men. The husbands start a rumor that Sula slept with white men, worsening the town's opinion of Sula. The town's hatred of Sula gives them the impetus to live harmoniously with one another, as well as treat
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As an adult, Nel chooses to get married, breaking the childhood promise of the girls to share everything. Sula lives a life of ardent independence and total disregard for social conventions. Shortly after Nel's wedding, Sula leaves the Bottom for 10 years. She has many affairs and attends college.
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from a poststructuralist perspective, urging black women critics to "develop and practice critical approaches interactively, dialogically" instead of viewing "black female identity as unitary essence yielding an indigenous critical methodology." As McDowell points out, the ambiguity of Sula as a
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Despite their differences, Sula and Nel become fiercely attached to each other as adolescents. They share every part of their lives, including the shared memory of a traumatic event. One day, they playfully swing a neighborhood boy, Chicken Little, around by his hands. Sula loses her grip, and he
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and unable to accept the world he used to belong in. As a way to compartmentalize the unpredictable nature of death, Shadrack invents a
National Suicide Day to be held annually on January 3. Shadrack proposed that Medallion citizens could kill themselves or each other on this day and be free from
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Many of the novel's female characters behave outside of typical gender norms for the time period. It is Helene's grandmother, Cecile, who stands in as a mother figure and her primary caretaker. Eva, Sula's grandmother, operates a boarding house and is about the business of her own version of
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386:: A quiet, cowardly, and reserved partially or possibly fully white man who rents out one of the rooms in the Peace household. It is believed that Tar Baby has come up to the Bottom to drink himself to death.
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Nel says goodbye to Sula at her gravestone, realizing that her loneliness was not from missing her ex-husband but from missing Sula. She cries in grief as she recalls the years spent without her.
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hospital, with Eva injured as well. Other residents of the Bottom believe Sula remained still because she was stunned by the incident. Eva believes that Sula stood and watched out of curiosity.
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The beauty of
Morrison's narrative is its complexity and its ability to illustrate the fluidity and valences of the black female subject as captured in the quotidian.
621:, in her essay "Toward a Black Feminist Criticism," advanced a definition of black feminist literary criticism and (in)famously performed a lesbian reading of
350:: Sula's uncle; Eva's son and youngest child. Plum was a WWI veteran and a heroin addict. Eva burns him alive with kerosene because of his mental instability.
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friend Nel thought it looked like a rose, Sula's affair partner Jude perceived it to be snake shaped, and
Shadrack saw the birthmark as tadpole shaped.
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The story is organized by chronological chapters labeled with years. In "1919," the first named character, handsome
Shadrack returns from
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824:"'Sula' Limited Series Based On Toni Morrison Novel In Works At HBO From Shannon M. Houston & Stephanie Allain's Homegrown Pictures"
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responded to Smith's challenge by acknowledging the need for a black feminist criticism and calling for a firmer definition of
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death for the rest of the year. The town begrudgingly accepts
Shadrack as a part of their community despite his outbursts.
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will adapt the novel into a television limited series. The project will be created and written by
Shannon M. Houston.
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Race-ing Justice, En-Gendering Power: Essays on Anita Hill, Clarence Thomas and the Construction of Social Reality
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When she returns to the Bottom and to Nel, who became a conventional wife and mother, they reconcile briefly.
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mothering, "directing the lives of her children, friends, strays, and constant stream of boarders" (30). In
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was integral to the formation of black feminist literary criticism. In 1977, black feminist literary critic
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In her essay "Boundaries: Or Distant Relations and Close Kin", McDowell draws on the critical practices of
344:: Sula's aunt; Eva Sr.'s youngest daughter and middle child. She married at fourteen and moved to Michigan.
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that states a Knowledge (XXG) editor's personal feelings or presents an original argument about a topic.
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faded enough for loneliness to crawl back in, is the only one saddened by her death.
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The Bottom was a Black neighborhood on a hill above the fictional town of Medallion,
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Birth of a Nation'hood: Gaze, Script, and Spectacle in the O. J. Simpson Case
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398:: The little boy who drowns when Sula accidentally threw him into the river.
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McDowell, Deborah E. "Boundaries: Or Distant Relations and Close Kin", in
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The Source of Self-Regard: Selected Essays, Speeches, and Meditations
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McDowell, Deborah E. "New directions for Black feminist criticism."
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374:: Nel's husband, who leaves Nel due to a love affair with Sula.
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The Mother/Daughter Plot: Narrative, Psychoanalysis, Feminism
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Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination
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personal reflection, personal essay, or argumentative essay
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remembers her old promise to Sula to share everything.
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332:: Sula's grandfather, who leaves Eva for another woman.
751:. School of Education, Indiana State University, 1980.
773:, Chicago, London: University of Chicago Press, 1989.
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796:. University of Minnesota Press. p. 111.
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505:Learn how and when to remove this message
712:. New York: Vintage International, 2004.
243:, her first novel to be published after
217:of all important aspects of the article.
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213:Please consider expanding the lead to
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552:Literary significance and criticism
239:is a 1973 novel by American author
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736:Toward a Black Feminist Criticism
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380:: Sula's confidant and lover.
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988:God Help the Child
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721:Hirsch, Marianne.
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202:lead section
176:
163:
1149:(1998 film)
1138:Adaptations
1052:Non-fiction
1025:New Orleans
642:Hazel Carby
372:Jude Greene
270:shell shock
266:World War I
1163:Categories
682:References
644:and reads
592:March 2024
531:Doubleness
518:Motherhood
495:March 2024
465:newspapers
390:The Deweys
360:Nel Wright
318:Sula Peace
312:Characters
223:March 2024
1041:Desdemona
1007:Recitatif
891:Works by
422:does not
324:Eva Peace
207:summarize
65:Publisher
1009:" (1983)
956:Paradise
932:Tar Baby
835:March 5,
366:Shadrack
249:(1970).
143:813/.5/4
47:Language
1146:Beloved
972:A Mercy
940:Beloved
578:Please
479:scholar
443:removed
428:sources
50:English
1111:(2019)
1103:(2017)
1095:(2004)
1071:(1992)
1044:(2011)
1036:(1986)
1028:(1982)
991:(2015)
983:(2012)
975:(2008)
967:(2003)
959:(1997)
951:(1992)
943:(1987)
935:(1981)
927:(1977)
919:(1973)
911:(1970)
900:Novels
481:
474:
467:
460:
452:
330:BoyBoy
180:
167:
130:662097
37:Author
1119:Other
1017:Plays
486:JSTOR
472:books
101:Pages
69:Knopf
55:Genre
20:Sula
980:Home
964:Love
948:Jazz
916:Sula
854:Sula
837:2024
710:Sula
664:Sula
660:Sula
646:Sula
640:and
623:Sula
615:Sula
536:Sula
525:Sula
458:news
426:any
424:cite
274:PTSD
259:Ohio
236:Sula
124:OCLC
110:ISBN
676:HBO
437:by
272:or
1165::
826:.
756:^
701:^
633:.
1005:"
884:e
877:t
870:v
839:.
605:)
599:(
594:)
590:(
586:.
508:)
502:(
497:)
493:(
483:·
476:·
469:·
462:·
445:.
431:.
225:)
221:(
211:.
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