Song Of Solomon, By Toni Morrison

Macon Dead II 's baby boy. A turbulent series of events transpires later on leading to Macon

Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon set in the mid-20th century provides an in-depth look at racism through the use of plot and character development throughout the novel. The author presents the friendship of two very different young men that depict the way one's upbringing can affect the outcome of their life. While Milkman and Guitar share an unbreakable bond as children, the older they get, the harder it becomes for them to remain being friends. In this novel, Morrison makes several statements regarding being a young African American in the second half of the 20th century through the portrayal of Guitar and Milkman’s response to racism, while Milkman represents those who remain isolated from issues in society and do nothing to better their situation in life, Guitar represents those who take action against injustices not only for their community but also to obtain some control over their own lives.

Materialistic possession plays a pivotal role within Milkman’s family and life offering a means of escape from dispossession, despite its eventual development into greed. Early in the book, when Milkman believes that his father was the absolute power within his household, Macon Dead Sr. is telling his family about buying some vacation homes on the lake and selling them to colored folks during the summer. He questions, “Who’s going to live in them?” This questioning tone reveals his distrust of his father and his agreement of the belief that “There’s no colored people who can afford two houses.” (Morrison 33) Milkman sees his father trying to fill and fix his dispossession but doesn't agree with his methods. Here he must confront his father's

After an argument between his parents unraveled, causing Milkman to act defiant to his father, influenced many contradictory feelings within himself. He had respected his father always, following his footsteps in order to place him. He never was forced to go to college due to his presence being a real help in his father’s office. Macon Dead wants his son to be like him and own things, rather than things own him. But ironically Milkman is being owned to be like him to his own liking and not Milkman. But now that Milkman stood up to his father, he did not apprehend how he felt in the situation, which emphasizes the fact how isolated and trapped his identity is. As he looks himself in the mirror, “ But it lacked coherence, a coming together of the features into a total self. It was all very tentative, the way he looked, like a man peeping around a corner of someplace he is not supposed to be, trying to make up his

Throughout Langston Hughes' novel, Not Without Laughter, the author introduces multiple characters that reveal their notions of prejudice. The novel explores that prejudice in one form or another is in every aspect of one's life. Prejudice can be defined as an opinion for or against a person's look, race, class, or religion, which is usually formed by a hasty generalization. Most of the main characters, Aunt Hager, Sister Johnson, Jimboy, Harriet, and Tempy contain different accounts of prejudice in the world, which stimulate many of Sandy's thoughts of life as he comes of age. Aunt Hager, Annjee, Harriet, and Sandy, are a multi-generation poor African American family that live in a small home together but are eventually divided by multiple circumstances. The story takes place during the 1910s in the small town of Stanton, Kansas.

Macon Dead is not a loving or kind businessman, father, or husband. He is hateful towards his wife, Ruth, and their relationship gives her little life. He constantly critiques her clothing, cooking, and actions, and, as a result, has become dead inside as one might say. Macon Dead’s treatment towards his children, First Corinthians, Magdalene “Lena”, and Macon “Milkman” Dead Jr, are similar. From an outsider’s perspective, Macon Dead seems to have it all–he is a well-off businessman with a groomed wife, the daughter of a doctor, and three behaved children. He drives around town in his nice car and is known by many, but his lustrous life is quite the opposite of his dull and dead internal life (32-33). The Dead household is reflective of the name: uneasy, awkward, and

In Song of Solomon Toni Morrison tells a story of one black man's journey toward an understanding of his own identity and his African American roots.  This black man, Macon "Milkman" Dead III, transforms throughout the novel from a naïve, egocentric, young man to a self-assured adult with an understanding of the importance of morals and family values.  Milkman is born into the burdens of the materialistic values of his father and the weight of a racist society.  Over the course of his journey into his family's past he discovers his family's values and ancestry, rids himself of the weight of his father's expectations and society's limitations, and literally learns to fly.

One of the points that is consistently brought up in Toni Morrison’s Paradise is that of the all black town “Ruby”. Paradise uses the setting of Oklahoma to discuss how many black towns are shaped by past history and religion. While the town in this novel is fictional, there have been real all black towns in the United States, and it seems that these towns influenced many aspects of the town Ruby, which is why it is so easy to imagine that the story could actually be real. Many authors have written in general about the novel, and specifically about the town within it.

Maya Angelou once said “Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible”. This sentiment is apparent in the novel Song of Solomon written by Toni Morrison and the film The Searchers directed by John Ford. In both these works of fiction prejudice is an underlying theme of the central plot. Throughout both plots, it becomes apparent the cause, cost and cure for prejudice taking the form of racism.

Milkman's journey from the beginning is never about the gold itself, Macon Dead’s motivation, but rather because he wants the ability to escape his dependance on his father. He soon realizes that the items that he once thought were valuable, his clothes, shoes, and watch, were essentially useless, and were worth ruining in the crossing of the river to the cave. He encounters many more setbacks like being attacked by a man with a knife, failing to find the gold, and having to evade Guitar’s attempts at murder, yet is still determined to discover his history. Guitar’s negative view of Milkman, that he would never help anyone with a crate selflessly and would steal gold, is misguided because he does not understand Milkman’s motivations

Struggling to accomplish anything on his own, Macon returns to his childhood home to further simplify his life. Hoping to find comfort with his siblings, Macon enters into their life of order and isolation from the

Majority of African American women get judged on the day to day basis. When scrolling through social media there will be large amounts of individuals who will bully or even belittle a colored female because of the natural kinks of her hair, her sense of fashion, the full shaped curves of her body, and the color of her skin . The poem “Still I Rise” by the well-known poet, Maya Angelou, specifically describes the reasons why she had so much confidence; even if she were to be judged by her appearances and mindset. This poem is about embracing females, but it mainly introduces similar life situations that many African American women have experienced. The symbols and point of view that Angelou specifically added in her poem made her readers realize that there are many meanings to this poem.

In most cases all anyone needs in life is love. But what is love? In The sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway we get the sad truth about what love sometimes is in the real world and in some cases alike this novel, there are many reasons in which love is lost. One of the reasons for lost love is sex. Unfortunately the sexual drive of other characters in the novel dictates whether they love each other or not. Another factor that plays a huge role of leaving love hopeless is alcohol. In this novel for some characters alcohol is a lifestyle, when drunken characters do careless acts in which you can never tell if their actions reveal their true feelings or if they did those actions because they are under the influence, so characters cast these actions and blame the actions on alcohol. The last factor is dissatisfaction with love. This means that characters in this novel are not satisfied with the love and relationship they have now and go on chasing for an even better love which does not exist leaving the love they used to have broken. Through mood, narration and description the author Ernest Hemingway develops the theme of hopeless love.

Twelve Years a Slave is a book which is written by Solomon Northup. He was born in New York. The book retail the author’s life story as a free black man from the North. He lived, got married to Anne Hampton, a woman of mixed (black, white, and Native American) and worked in New York, where is his family stayed. Besides, he was a great laborer and a violin player. In 1841, at the age of 33 a two con men offered him a profitable job which pays more than his previous jobs. He was going to work as a musician playing violin in the circus so he decided to travel to Washington D.C. And that 's where he was drugged and kidnapped. They sold him as a slave in Louisiana into the Red River. He worked for 12 years on plantations before he was released after 12 years being a slave. In these twelve years, he moved to a several slave’s masters. In most of these years he lived under a cruel ownership called Edwin Epps who was a planter in the south. In 1853, he was finally released by a group of his friends from the North, who came to rescue him. After he returned his home in New York, he decided with the help of Editor David Wilson to write a novel called a Twelve Years a Slave, describing his story and what happened with him along his slavery time.

My independent reading book, Beloved by Toni Morrison, was so full of heavy emotion. I really admire Toni Morrison’s use of language. She gives so much detail that I feel like I am there experiencing everything that Sethe is experiencing. She creates an irie suspense that bad things have happened in Sethe’s past and reveals them one by one as Sethe remember and lives through these memories. Morrison beautifully conveys the message that the past cannot be forgotten, it is always to be with us no matter how much we say we have forgotten it. The horrid memories that we put to death will always hurt, because “anything dead coming back to life hurts.” (Morrison)