Beyond “normal signs of vulnerability”: A Different Mode of Relationality in Toni Morrison’s Sula
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In her second novel Sula (1973), Toni Morrison explores possibilities for a new black female subjectivity through her characterization of Sula. In general, scholars have analyzed Sula as transgressive because she seems to lead an independent, monadic life, unconcerned of and disconnected from the ways of the community—free, but dangerously free. However, Sula is a deeply ambivalent figure, who is free and unmindful of the community, and yet profoundly lonely and defensive at the same time. This ambivalence of Sula needs more attention, and accordingly, I employ Judith Butler’s notions of vulnerability and grief in analyzing her character. These concepts can shed a new light upon Sula’s seeming solipsism and offer a new interpretation for her as an ambivalent character who, even as a seemingly monadic individual, in fact exists in relation with others, by recognizing her and others’ vulnerability and taking responsibility for the relationality between herself and others. Specifically, Sula’s loss of a consistent sense of self as a result of her accidental killing of Chicken Little is discussed as what reveals Sula’s vulnerability and precariousness. By articulating the vulnerability of Sula which may not be easily recognizable, this paper examines how Morrison problematizes the limited and homogenized perspective in which a figure like Sula is excluded and dehumanized into a life that is not worth grieving for.
Abstract
In her second novel Sula (1973), Toni Morrison explores possibilities for a new black female subjectivity through her characterization of Sula. In general, scholars have analyzed Sula as transgressive because she seems to lead an independent, monadic life, unconcerned of and disconnected from the ways of the community—free, but dangerously free. However, Sula is a deeply ambivalent figure, who is free and unmindful of the community, and yet profoundly lonely and defensive at the same time. This ambivalence of Sula needs more attention, and accordingly, I employ Judith Butler’s notions of vulnerability and grief in analyzing her character. These concepts can shed a new light upon Sula’s seeming solipsism and offer a new interpretation for her as an ambivalent character who, even as a seemingly monadic individual, in fact exists in relation with others, by recognizing her and others’ vulnerability and taking responsibility for the relationality between herself and others. Specifically, Sula’s loss of a consistent sense of self as a result of her accidental killing of Chicken Little is discussed as what reveals Sula’s vulnerability and precariousness. By articulating the vulnerability of Sula which may not be easily recognizable, this paper examines how Morrison problematizes the limited and homogenized perspective in which a figure like Sula is excluded and dehumanized into a life that is not worth grieving for.
참고문헌 (11)
- Baillie, Justine, "Toni Morrison an Literary Tradition : The Invention of an Aesthetic" (2013), Bloomsbury
- Butler, Judith, "Precarious Life : The Powers of Mourning and Violence" (2004), Verso
- Butler, Judith, "Frames of War: When is Life Grievable" (2009), Verso
- Galehouse, Maggie, "New world woman: Toni Morrison’s Sula", Papers on Language and Literature, 35(4), pp.339~362 (1999)
- Hull, Gloria T., "All the Women Are White, All the Blacks are Men, But Some of Us Are Brave: Black Women’s Studies", pp.xvii~xxxi (1982), The Feminist Press
- Jones, Carolyn M., "Sula and Beloved: Images of Cain in the Novels of Toni Morrison", African American Review, 27(4), pp.615~626 (1993)
- McDowell, Deborah E., "Afro-American Literary Study in the 1990s", pp.51~70 (1989), U of Chicago P
- Morrison, Toni., "Sula" (2004), Vintage
- Nissen, Axel., "Form Matters: Toni Morrison’s Sula and the Ethics of Narrative", Contemporary Literature, 40(2), pp.263~285 (1999)
- Smith, Valerie., "Toni Morrison : Writing the Moral Imagination" (2012), Wiley-Blackwell