Introduction
Toni Morrison says in her article “Unspeakable Things Unspoken: The Afro-American Presence in American Literature” that “the trauma of racism is, for the racist and the sufferer, the extreme disintegration of the self, and has usually appeared to me a cause (not a symptom) of insanity” (Morrison, 1988, p. 141). Most of Morrison’s works excel in bringing to light this shattered self via depictions of the “unimaginable.” Individuals who are outcast, abandoned, deserted, or perverted; those who maim themselves, murder people, or commit suicide are shown as ordinary participants of Morrison’s imagined society. Owing to the internal division caused by white, racist culture, these persons inevitably mistreat or harm themselves or others, whether emotionally, physically, or socially abject.
Morrison presents individuals in her works who battle with love, marriage, and parenting, all common settings of adversity, as well as racial adversity that is both their inheritance and affliction in white culture. As will be seen in Sula, the latter invariably affects the former’s characteristics. Morrison also demonstrates how, while the abject persona generated by racism is abhorrent, the abject boundaries of humanity are nevertheless essential and, in the end, unavoidable. Sula by Toni Morrison depicts a more nuanced link between abjection and selfhood in which an individual abjected by white Americans is equally subject to a variety of circumstances inside their racial community.
Background
Toni Morrison started composing Sula more than fifty decades ago. This was a period of intense mobilization among African Americans and many others fighting for civil rights and social equality (Middleton, 2016). The novel explores racism, discrimination, and oppression against African Americans. It illustrates the anguish individuals have when they cannot find respectable work and the resilience of many to live. Case in point, Eva chops her leg to earn money to support her household. The author demonstrates how, when confronted with racist conditions, a number of folks were forced to crawl to whites, as Helene acts on a passenger train to the South. On the contrary, some responded, like Sula demonstrates when she confronts young white lads bullying her and Nel. The work garnered favorable reviews from commentators, who lauded her evocative descriptions, excellent characterization, beautiful style, and succinct, realistic conversations (Thurman, 2021). Accordingly, it remains one of the best books written by the author.
Broadly, Sula is set at the start of the 1900s in the tiny Ohio town of Medallion. It follows the narrative of two black friends, Sula and Nel, during their adolescence up to maturity and, ultimately, Sula’s demise. The author based her narrative of obedience and resistance on her small-town, Midwestern youth (Middleton, 2016). Sula may also be understood as a tale about the African-American struggle in the first decades of the twentieth century. Thus, it is not merely a novel that talks about the relationship and competition between Sula and Nel.
As the story opens, African Americans in the U. S. are living in terror and squalor. Post-Civil War, Blacks were emancipated from enslavement, but they were still subjected to various types of economic subordination and social discrimination (Middleton, 2016). In reality, African Americans have practically limited legal or political authority, allowing racist whites to exploit and rule them irresponsibly. According to Middleton (2016), the goal was that African Americans would acquire political freedom by participating in World War I, but this proved to be mainly false. Despite the black community’s devotion to the U.S. throughout the war, Woodrow Wilson’s administration showed little interest in extending additional legal and political safeguards.
Morrison refers to the ungrateful contribution of African-Americans during World War I through the figure of Shadrack—a youthful, muscular African American who battles in Europe and comes home a shattered man. Lastly, Morrison’s work refers to the African American community’s economic background in America. In the 1930s and 1940s, blacks obtained certain legal rights, mainly due to establishing their enterprises and increasing their income (Middleton, 2016). Two to three decades later, the book concludes that there were an increasing number of affluent black households, but most African Americans continued to face severe discrimination in the U.S. Although blacks had additional income and privileges than in previous years, they remained generally relegated to impoverished, segregated areas isolated from whites.
Concept
Body theories are especially relevant for feminists since the body has traditionally been connected with the feminine. Typically, women or females have been disparaged as feeble, immoral, dirty, or decomposing. Kristeva hypothesized the relationship between body and mind, nature and culture, soma and psyche, and matter and representation in her literature throughout her active writing. She claimed that representation both discharges physical urges and that the rationality of meaning is actively functioning in the material body (Kristeva, 2017). Kristeva creates a concept of abjection in “Powers of Horror” that has proven valuable in identifying domination mechanisms. She defines abjection as a psychological activity in which subjective and collective identities are formed by rejecting everything that threatens one’s own (or company’s) boundaries (Kristeva, 2017). The primary danger to the developing subject is their reliance on the mother body. As a result, abjection is inextricably linked to the caregiving role.
The corpse, which horrifically reminds humans of their physicality, perfectly illustrates what produces such a response. Nevertheless, other objects may evoke a comparable reaction, including exposed wounds, feces, filth, and many more. Kristeva expressly ties the abject with the emergence of the real into human life. She equates this kind of reaction with the human rejection of death’s relentless physicality (Kristeva, 2017). Human reaction to these abject things re-energizes what is fundamentally a pre-linguistic reaction. Kristeva is cautious to distinguish awareness of death or its purpose (which may coexist inside the symbolic order) from the horrific sensation of being faced with the actuality that gruesomely displays one’s mortality.
Kristeva chose to publish on the forgotten, concerning what people do not wish to see, smell, or experience. She distinguishes the object and the abject, which seems related to the Freudian mechanism or method of inhibition, denial, and denunciation inherent in the creation of the human individual (Kristeva, 2017). Thus, the abject is an individual’s history or hidden awareness. Abjection is a by-product of the oldest and most forgotten fight to free oneself from the maternal parent, who is unwilling to acknowledge the symbolic domain.
However, symbolism alone is insufficient to establish the divide. To remove the infant from the mother, the latter must be rejected: “The abject would therefore become the target of primordial repression” (Alexander, 2019, p.21). The mother is rejected via hygiene routines, toilet instruction, and dietary behavior, among other things. Even if the mother feels alienated from her own body as a result of these harrowing experiences, it is still possible to reconcile with it. Overtly, abjection in literature is a feeling that an author might evoke using imagery or the personalities of their protagonists. This feeling leads to a disconnect between the body and self, which ultimately destroys. This is shown in Sula through characters such as Sula, Eve, and Nel.
Plot Analysis
Morrison’s Sula concerns Nel Wright and Sula Peace’s friendship, as well as how the black neighborhood of Medallion, Ohio, dreads the eccentric and unmarried Sula. Nel and Sula were bred in rather contrasting families. Nel’s is clean, well-organized, and hygienic. When Helene, Nel’s mother, embraces a subservient, endearing demeanor toward a white train conductor, the occasion is introduced as meaningful in Nel’s personality creation: “An eagerness to please and an apology for living met in (Helene’s) voice… Like a street pup wagging its tail at the very doorjamb of the butcher shop he had been kicked away from only moments before, Helene smiled” (Morrison, 1998, p. 20). Nel learns to secretly detest her own blackness from her mother. The message is delivered publicly and privately, with Helene reprimanding her daughter at home, stating, “Honey, do not simply sit there. You can pull your nose “to make it slimmer (Morrison, 1998, p. 28).
Notwithstanding these negative sentiments, Nel looks in the mirror following their train ride south and experiences a deeper awareness of herself: “She got out of bed and turned on the lamp to check herself in the mirror. Her face was there, with her plain brown eyes, three braids, and the nose her mother despised. She watched for a long time before a shudder passed through her. ‘I am myself,’ she said quietly. ‘Me,’… Every time she used the word “myself,” she felt a surge of power, delight, and dread “(Morrison, 1998, p. 28). There is a more negative component to this situation in that the odd interaction between the black population and an encroaching white culture distorts and complicates the behavior of individuals inside the black community. Nel’s ‘me-ness’ emerges immediately after witnessing her mother’s experience as a black woman in a predominantly white culture (Morrison, 1998, p. 43). Nonetheless, Nel develops a feeling of self-identity that Sula can never comprehend.
Sula resides in an awkwardly designed home with her mother and grandmother, Eva, as well as other renters Eva has welcomed. It is a tumultuous home where affection is there yet scarce. Eva’s personal losses and challenges forced her into a preservation mindset years ago, which she appears to be perpetuating. When her partner abandoned her to rear two kids by herself, she went missing for a time and reappeared with just one leg; speculations circulated that she “put it beneath a train and had their pay off” or “offered it to a clinic for $10,000” (Morrison, 1998, p. 31 ). Whichever the case, it appears that Eva turned to mutilate her body as a final resource to provide for her household. When Hannah ponders over her childhood and confronts Eva if she truly adores her, Eva reacts angrily:
“You settin’ here with your healthy-ass self and ax me did I love you?
The big old eyes in your head would a been two holes full of maggots if I hadn’t” (Morrison, 1998, p. 68)
With Morrison’s writing, Eva’s angry reaction is Something most parents would understand. These moms and dads, trying their best to live in a polity that considers them as inferior people or worse, strive to satisfy the physical requirements of their kids, sometimes lacking the time, strength, or internal fortitude to address emotional and psychological demands. Eva’s parental toughness is additionally emphasized when readers discover that she set Plum, who apparently is her son, ablaze. After he returned from World War I, addicted to drugs, she had frequent dreams that he wanted to crawl back into her womb and be a child once more. Eva feels compelled to act because she is fairly confident that Plum will keep living the life of a baby and refuse to embrace the responsibilities of a grownup.
Hannah is shocked to learn that her mother killed her brother. However, Eva conveys the details clearly in a strange, somewhat disengaged style that reveals her mental divide: “When Eva finally spoke, she did it in two voices. It seemed as if two people were speaking at the same moment, one a fraction of a second after the other “(Morrison, 1998, p. 71). Eva’s absentee caregiving is blamed for Hannah’s sexual practices with men: she frequently has sex with anybody who is willing. Her mother’s anguish is transferred to Sula after she eavesdrops on her informing an acquaintance: “I adore Sula. I simply do not like her “(Morrison, 1998, p. 57). Sula is caught standing on the terrace, witnessing her mother being wasted by roaring flames, and does nothing to extinguish the flames. Conversely, when Hannah starts burning herself, Eva leaps out a window to rescue her.
Sula’s apparent apathy despite witnessing Hannah hurt reflects the absence of affection she had from her mother. At some point, it appears that the death of the mother compromises the individual’s sense of identity. On the contrary, the mother is an individual who recognizes the kid, not just an object that the kid can see. Therefore, it can be argued that the awareness of oneself as an individual beneath the caring watch of the mother is a vital element in the formation of the self. Sula becomes an individual with shattered subjectivity as a result of not receiving this attention as a child, and his apathetic behaviors cause greater suffering to society.
Sula slashes off the tip of her left forefinger when boys harass Nel as she walks home from school to send a message that she is a volatile character that should be avoided. Sula, by mimicking Eva’s cutting off her own limb, demonstrates a disconnected attachment to her own body, particularly as a toddler. Nevertheless, the girls connect in other aspects, such as through reciprocity:
“Because they would realized years earlier that they were not white or male, and that all liberty and success were out of bounds for them, they would go about developing Something else to be. Their encounter was good since it allowed them to learn from one another. Daughters of distant moms and unfathomable dads… they found the companionship they sought in each other’s gaze” (Morrison, 1998, p. 52).
In a neighborhood where black lads are abusers and black girls have no value, Nel and Sula act as mothers to one another. They practically assist one another in burying the abject in one moment when playing outside. Upon digging a pit with twigs, they start throwing junk into it: “Each then searched about for more detritus to toss into the pit: paper, shards of glass, and cigarettes butts, until all of the minor defiling items they could locate were piled there” (Morrison, 1998, p. 59). This scenario, in which they bury “little defiling items,” acts as a simulation of abjection and reinforces the positive self-modeling they see in one another’s eyes. The girls’ profound mutuality exemplifies the battle that shapes humans, the mimesis through which one becomes identical to another to become oneself. However, their connection develops to the extent that “their relationship was so deep that they had trouble separating one another’s thoughts” (Morrison, 1998, p. 83). The eventual absence of limits between Sula and Nel exemplifies the precarious nature of each girl’s definition of self and predicts their impending suffering.
Gradually, adulthood, predictably, alters their bond, which, one way or another, was inescapable. Nel’s background in a rural household equips her for a conventional marriage. The psychological dynamics of her marriage to Jude are foreshadowed when the narrator says, “The two of them together would make one Jude…. Jude could see himself taking shape in her eyes” (83). The psychological aspects of her engagement to Jude are hinted at when the author adds, “The two of them together would become one Jude…. Jude could feel himself taking shape in her eyes” (83). Nel partly compromises the self-identity Sula aided her to gain by embracing sexist norms regarding how a female’s subjectivity should become subordinate to her spouse. Conversely, Sula departs town for ten years before returning “Accompanied by a robin plague. Residents in Medallion “could not move around without stepping in (the robins’) pearly feces, and it was impossible to hang laundry, pick weeds, or simply relax on the main yard whilst robins were hovering and dying everywhere around you” (Morrison, 1998, p. 89).
Sula’s return is therefore linked to the abject subject of bird feces and death, forecasting the devastation she would wreak on her neighborhood, especially her closest friend. When Eva voices fear that Sula, at thirty, is still unmarried, Sula’s response demonstrates her defiance of the convention: “I do not wish to create anybody else. I would want to create myself.” Eva reminds her that this is “selfish. No woman has any business wandering about without a man” (Morrison, 1998, p. 92). Sula, like her mother, wants to spend limited time with different men. Sula’s conduct progressively exemplifies the abject’s definition as a boundary-pushing force. Thus, the abject is twisted in that it neither abandons nor embraces a taboo, a norm, or a law; rather, it ignores, misleads, and debases them. Likewise, it employs and exploits them in order to reject them. In other words, it appears to alleviate the pain of everyone else for its own gain.
Sula exemplifies the above perfectly when she has an affair with Jude, the husband of Nel, and finds nothing wrong with her act. Sula is distraught when Jude breaks up with Nel, and his life crumbles, making her feel like a regular wife. Losing Jude triggers a major identity crisis for Nel and creates a distortion of the comfortable conditioned self. When she loses him, she goes through a period of intense mourning that threatens to rip her sense of self apart. While seated on the shower floor, Nel works through her despair by imagining a sequence of areas where life meets the abject:
“If I could guarantee that I could stay in this small white room with dirty tile and gurgling water in the pipes and my head on the cool rim of this bathtub without ever having to leave, I would be content. If I could guarantee that I would never have to get up to flush the toilet, enter the kitchen, see my children grow and die, or see my food eaten on my plate…” (Morrison, 1998, p. 108).
After Nel regains her composure and resumes her daily routine, she is left with “nothing but a flake of something dry and horrible in her throat” (Morrison, 1998, p. 108). Nonetheless, she becomes aware that Something is following her everywhere she goes: “Something was just to her right, in the air, just out of sight. She could not see it, yet she was well aware of its appearance. A greyish ball hovers nearby. Simply there. To the left. Quiet, dingy, and filthy. A ball of muddy threads that is devoid of weight, fluffy yet malevolent in its malice “(Morrison, 1998, p. 109).
While Nel is frightened that the thing continues to float close to her, she is simultaneously desperate to avoid acknowledging or looking at it, fearful of what it could do to her: “It just hovered there for her to see if she so desired, and 0 my God for her to touch if she so desired. But she never wanted to see it because if she did, who knew what she would do if she stretched out her hand and stroked it? Almost certainly die, but no terrible than that “(Morrison, 1998, p. 110). The author appears to portray a physical picture of the abject that is unrelated to race—the alluring but terrifying mass of deformity and feeling that should be suppressed for fear of undoing the self.
Morrison portrays a protagonist whose behaviors are, at times, impossible to justify in the role of Sula. The storyteller further adds that Sula had “no need to satisfy anybody, save those whose pleasure delighted her” (Morrison, 1998, p. 118). Hearing her mother express dissatisfaction with her “educated (Sula) that there was no one else to rely on,” and having “no ego… she felt no urge to prove herself—be consistent with herself” (Morrison, 1998, p. 119). Sula is paradoxically selfish and unable to connect to people reliably because she lacks a solid bond with herself. She forces the non-disabled Eva into a care facility against her will and inflicts the harshest wounds conceivable on Nel, her sole true acquaintance. Currently hated by her society due to her unusual attire and demeanor, she is additionally condemned for her handling of Eva and Nel by the residents of Medallion. Sula seems traumatized when she discovers how deeply she has wounded Nel during their confrontation: “She had clung to Nel as the closest thing to both an other and a self, only to find that she and Nel were not one and the same” (Morrison, 1998, p. 119).
The inference is that Sula believed she and Nel were identical. Consequently, she may have believed that while Jude belonged to Nel, he also belonged to her. Even as an adult, she does not seem to have attained selfhood. That is, the ability to feel independent indicates a genuine recognition of one’s uniqueness in relation to others. Regardless of how strongly she is dedicated to other people’s pleasure or pain, they are not her, and she is not them. Soon after Nel’s visitation, Sula dies from an apparent medication overdose, lying isolated in the fetal posture on Eva’s bed. Here, Sula and Eva are portrayed as having striking parallels. They employ drastic steps such as slicing pieces of themselves to send a message that they will live and stay as intact as possible. Interestingly, the two ladies endure their last years isolated and dismembered, separated from each other and the family ties they have.
Sula undoubtedly exhibits fragile subjectivity, both in her interactions with her neighborhood and family and friends and in her immature conception of the self’s connection to others. The narrative references adversaries such as good versus evil, virgin versus prostitute, and oneself versus others, yet progresses above them, rejecting the deceptive choices implied and dictated by these rivalries. This concept is shown by how Sula’s personality remains inextricably tied to Nel’s long after the story concludes. During Nel’s visit to Eva in the care facility, the elderly lady replies, “You are the one. Sula. “What is the difference?” and “Exactly the same.” You two, together. There was never any distinction between you” (Morrison, 1998, p. 169). These remarks seem absurd when they are juxtaposed with the storylines of every figure. Possibly Morrison is challenging the customary permanence of selfhood, implying the force of shared identity that emerges from a relationship like Nel’s and Sula’s.
What occurs to the two acquaintances is analogous to the disorientation that follows when someone’s conscious and unconscious identities get separated. Sula’s passing forces Nel to confront the fact that she has destroyed a significant part of her identity in her relentless pursuit of traditional acceptability. To reclaim her individuality as a complete human, she must resurrect that buried component. At the novel’s conclusion, Nel’s heartbreaking lament for her deceased companion is thus a metaphorical lament for that lost aspect of identity. Sula is not a factual representation of femininity; she investigates a facet of the female consciousness or self that is frequently concealed from exposure due to the fear and difficulty in dealing with it. This evocation of dread and the notion that Something is overly “frightening” to cope with is a concept of abject terror, as is the abject’s relationship with the feminine’s conventionally understood evil nature.
The community’s contempt for Sula reaffirms its character as just, appropriate, and, most crucially, apart from her. Upon Sula’s return to town after a lengthy sabbatical, the danger she poses inspires individuals in her immediate vicinity to deepen their bonds momentarily: “Once they recognized the root of their tragedy, they were free to defend and love each other. They began to value their spouses and wives, to safeguard their children, to restore their houses, and to band together in common against the demon in their midst “(Morrison, 1998, p. 118). In comparison, upon Sula’s demise,
“Mothers who had protected their children against Sula’s malice… now faced nothing. The animosity had dissipated, as had the motivation for their efforts. Without her sarcasm, their compassion for others deteriorated… They reverted to a simmering hatred of the constraints of old age. Wives uncoddled their husbands; it appeared as though there was no more need to bolster their ego” (Morrison, 1998, p. 154).
Sula embodies the abject power and menace, undermining society’s morality and bounds via her anarchy and unfettered selfishness. Paradoxically, despite her rejection, her existence assists others in becoming more unified in their connections with one another via their antagonism to her. Morrison also indicates in this way that a knowledge of the abject increases the society’s relationship bonds. Perfect for her association with abjection, Sula continues to be an unsettlingly ambiguous figure throughout the work, one that audiences can either despise or empathize with, condemn fiercely or adore.
Conclusion
Sula is a book of incisive and colorful writing presented with a skill that educates while keeping the book going, notwithstanding the absence of a straightforward storyline. Morrison is thrifty with her historical tales, which keeps the plot moving forward. Likewise, she does not refrain from forbidden subjects like sexuality, mortality, and self-mutilation, which can unnerve some readers, but is reflected by Sula’s society and their response to her disregard for their norms. Toni Morrison’s book is a fascinating remembrance of her evocative, renowned voice. She describes growing up in a tiny, impoverished black community in Ohio, where Neal and Sula become great friends. Sula focuses on powerful female narratives, particularly those who are weighed down by or overpowered by society’s standards. Morrison’s vocabulary and anecdotes effectively explain how long-term solutions to societal difficulties such as injustice and racism are required due to their damaging effects on people’s self-awareness.
References
Alexander, L. (2019). Fatal attractions, abjection, and the self in literature from the restoration to the romantics. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Kristeva, J. (2017). Powers of horror: An essay on abjection. Kbh: Nota.
Middleton, D. L. (2016). Toni Morrison’s fiction: Contemporary criticism. Routledge.
Morrison, T. (1988). Unspeakable things unspoken: The Afro-American presence in American literature. Michigan Quarterly Review, 28(1), 124-161. Web.
Morrison, T. (1998). Sula. London: Vintage.
Thurman, D. (2021). Sula’s compromise: Toni Morrison and the editorial politics of sensitivity. MELUS, 46(2), 1-23. Web.