Eva Peace

I was the most intrigued with Eva Peace and her character. When her husband, BoyBoy, left her I saw that she wanted him back and was excited to see him once again. Just like any woman, she was happy to have him back into her life and she did not know what to really expect. My heart went out to her when he came to her house and made her feel like a low life. The scene where she watched him laugh about her to his girlfriend tore her heart up. It was then that I believe she truly learned how to live on hatred and to have a hardened heart. Her emotions were shut down and bottled up. When she was later asked if she loved the kids or not, I believe that the pain BoyBoy brought on her is what caused her to not know how to truly express herself.

My thoughts on her burning Plum up in his bedroom showed me that she actually DID love him, but that was just her way of showing it. He came back from the war, but his demeanor and character was destroyed. I believe he was doing drugs which caused him to be completely childish and she felt like she was out of control in helping him. Any mother wants their child to not be surrounded by misery and her actions of burning him up is what justifies it all.

I found it very interesting to see that she put her leg across the railroad tracks and lost her led in order to collect money. She was a satisfied woman with a certain level of a satisfactory life. Why would she do that? I believe that even though that was a crazy thing to do, it was HER way of showing that she loves and cares for those in her house. She needed ways to help take care of everyone and did what she thought she needed to do.

Sula's Death

How in the world did Sula die? I am thinking that it is most likely from AIDS because she was sleeping around with so many men. However, it seemed as if smoke were surrounding her or that she was burning while she was dying. Did Nel set the house on fire???

Nel's Family Tree

Cecile Sabat and unnamed husband had
        - Rochelle Sabat (Creole prostitute) and unknown lover had
              - Helene [Sabat] Wright and Wiley Wright, husband, (grandnephew of Aunt Cecile Sabat) had
                  -Nel (Wright)Greene and Jude Greene, husband, had
                     -two boys and one girl (so far unnamed). 

What's in a name?

What was the reason why Morrison chose the names she did?
Was there a reason why she chose Helene and Hannah? They are similar in structure, but have stronger connotations. One requires more effort to pronounce correctly. The other is almost a mutter between the lips. 
What is the significance between "Nel" and "Sula"? What is the heritage in the names?


I will research this, but if anyone can answer, please help me out. 






-Stephanie Schroepfer

Symbolism in Sula

What does the "hand" mean for Shadrack?
Why did it look bigger?
Aren't big hands good?
Why was he so freaked out over it?
Does it come up again in the end?
What does it mean?

Denial never works in your favor..

I'm in the middle of the book, when an old Shaggy song from my childhood pops in my head! 
"Honey came in and she caught me red-handed, creeping with the girl next door. Picture this, we were both butt naked, bangin' on the bathroom floor. I had tried to keep her from what she was about to see. Why would she believe me when I told her it wasn't me?"
Toni Morrison makes no pretenses in her novel. She shows each character with their flaws. Sula is a dangerous woman. Not because she is violent, or psychotic, but because she is inclined to feed her sexual appetite no matter where it leads. Nel is volatile. "Her parents had succeeded in rubbing down to a dull glow any sparkle or splutter she had" (83). She is about to erupt at any moment. She never does what she wants to do. She only does what she is expected to do. Only with her best friend can she take leadership, be aggressive, and more fully express herself. 
Each character has MANY flaws. Morison has no shame in telling each story. She shows the flaws and the features. Each character has a story. I will elaborate in later posts. 


-StephanieSchroepfer

PTSD- Shadrack

My heart broke for Shadrack. He was only twenty-two years old and had been faced with a situation that would haunt his poor life forever. When Morrison described the horrific scene of a man in World War II getting his head blown off and still running around with brain oozing from the side of his neck, I couldn't help but think that anyone at any age would have quite the difficult time witnessing that scene. Yet, when Shadrack was in the hospital the nurses and doctors seemed annoyed with him. He had just finished fighting for their country, but because he was a black man they did not give him any time of day. They did not realize or even understand the effect war had on young men at that time. The medical professionals greatly underestimated the stress the men and women at war were under once they returned back to normalcy. I would diagnose Shadrack with PTSD- post traumatic stress disorder. When he was discharged from the hospital and returned to the Bottom, his neighbors and family should have paid more attention to him and his chartered, "National Suicide Day." Obviously, Shadrack has issues with death. His neighbors only participated in National Suicide Day in the sense that they organized their calendars around the day ensuring that nothing important or dear to their lives was scheduled on the day that Shadrack rang the cowbell announcing that death could not be a surprise on "this day." I would be foolish to expect Shadrack to have a happy life after his desperate attempt to understand why death hovers over his shoulder.

Welcome to the Bottom

The hills above Medallion was called the Bottom. The irony in the name is evident as the author discusses how the Negro people were tricked into living in the Bottom by the white men. Even though the Negro was a free man, the white man still treated him as an ignorant slave and tricked him into excepting wasted land that he promised was the thumbprint of God. That moment on marked the beginning of the painful Bottom history, "...the laughter was part of the pain," (pg 4). Recounting the history behind the Bottom helps the readers understand what type of story the reader is about to dive into. By the title, "Sula," I believed that Sula would be quickly introduced in the story and explained in detail, but that is not so. Instead, she does not appear until a quarter of the way into the book. I am still learning about her role, and who she is, but the description of the Bottom from the beginning has helped me visualize the setting, the area, and the people that inhabit the Bottom before it was going through it's urbanized changes. It's amazing that even the smallest town could house such great accounts of personal life histories. The Bottom is only the beginning. The Bottom is where we begin, it is where I begin, and I am sure it is inevitably where I will end.