However, Toni Morrison turns this on its head. Paul D thinks to himself, "Risky, very risky for a used-to-be-slave woman to love anything that much was dangerous, especially if it was her children... The best thing was to love just a little bit; everything, just a little bit, so when they broke its back or shoved it in a croaker sack, maybe you'd have a little love left over for the next one" (54).
This is, to put it bluntly, uncomfortable to read. The idea that a mother should hold off loving a child is something that goes against the very fabric of society, and yet Paul D says it as flippantly as I might comment on the way my niece is attached to a stuffed animal.
I don't think a writer as deliberate as Tony Morrison gives anything a whole paragraph without having a veiled purpose behind it. Two such purposes jump to my mind. First, is that it is to very simply make us uncomfortably just as the mention of the Sweet Home men "fucking cows" (13). Slavery isn't supposed to be an easy thing to talk about and Morrison isn't going to let us off easy.
The second possible purpose to me is more devious and interesting. Children haunt the book, both in a literal and figurative sense, and keep on coming back to influence their parents. The idea that they could be returning simply because they never got their mothers love is an interesting idea to consider. Maybe Denver was the only child that Sethe actually loved. After her baby entered the "spirit world" maybe she not feel satisfied with her treatment? Did she return to haunt Sethe and force her to return the love the baby felt she deserved? Who knows, well people who finished the book have, but I am not yet one of those illustrious few so I am left to wonder.
I also like how Toni Morrison has created the character Paul D. He has had to adapt to life at Sweet Home and as a member of a chain gang who has never been allowed to build relationships. It seems like slavery has drove these people to lead broken lives where they feel they cannot love and cannot trust family.
ReplyDeleteI think you made a very good point about how Toni Morrison creates an unveiled look at slavery and its effects, notably with the descriptions of lost and separated families. I also like your point about Morrison turning on its head the idea of a mother loving her child.
ReplyDeleteI agree, a writer like Morrison would not write about something if she didn't have a meaning behind it that she wanted her reader to see. The idea of children haunting the book due to lack of affection is fascinating and something I haven't thought of.
ReplyDelete