Responsibility

     A sense of responsibility is seen very clearly in Guitar, who feels responsible to his parents to rectify the injustice they experienced by taking every injustice committed against a black person as a strike against him. His involvement with the Seven Days stems from his responsibility to his people. Milkman is scared by the intensity of Guitar's devotion, and Guitar is scared by Milkman's complete lack of identity as a black man. In fact, in the first section of the book, Milkman has no discernible sense of responsibility to anything or anyone. His only loyalty is to himself and his desire to obtain material objects for his own pleasure. The first time there is a breakthrough with Milkman occurs in Danville, where his eyes are opened to a world much bigger than him. He finds a culture in which he belongs, not because of his fancy clothes or  socioeconomic status, but because of his ancestry. He finally begins to feel responsible for his family, owning his race and his heritage. Had he not felt so bound by the legacy of his grandfather to avenge his wrongful death, he would not have been able to push himself through the mud and rocks to discover the cave. The Milkman prior to his speaking with the Reverend and Circe would have fled to the safety of his hometown reputation as soon he encountered even a remote challenge. However, the evolved Milkman is motivated by something larger than himself and his desire for the gold. He finally feels the responsibility to his people he had been lacking for all his life, and he thereby gains purpose both for carrying on in his mission to find the gold and purpose for his life in its entirety as he learns to see the people around him as valuable.

Good and Evil

     In Song of Soloman, the battle between good and evil is not quite as cut and dry as it may be in other works of literature. While the main over arching good is the innocent man, in most cases the black man, and the evil is the man committing acts of discrimination and cruelty, it is not all black in white. Milkman is the central character of the novel and while he may not be evil, he is not likable for at least over half of the book. He cares far too much about material possessions and far too little about the people around him. Then Guitar, his foil in the beginning the book, has the passion and sympathy Milkman lacks, but he is plotting the mass murder of innocent white school children. His need for vengeance comes at a very high price and cannot be regarded as honorable as he seems to know his actions are not only morally wrong, but also will not improve the plight of the black man. The good and evil in this book can not be attributed to one sole character but rather the social constructs of equality, awareness, and self-discovery, with the evil being the negative character traits inhibiting their achievement, like Milkman's egoism and Guitar's bloodlust. The blurring between good and evil, while at times frustrating, is an indicator of Morrison's strong ability to create multifaceted rich characters without running the risk of being flat.

Qualifying Poetry

            I think that poetry is the use of language to create meaning through art. I originally substituted words in for language, but I find that poetry uses much more than words. Poetry is full of poetic devices and carefully placed spaces all to create one cohesive final product. As time has passed, poetry has evolved from the very structured haikus and sonnets to a much more free flowing medium. I think what makes an arrangement of words poetry is that at least one person can find meaning in that particular assortment of words. What leads some people to dislike certain poems is perhaps their own inability to find the meaning the poet or other readers found. Even those who find the meaning can dislike the feeling that that meaning arouses within them. Certain poems evoke a feeling of sadness or loneliness that readers do not want to confront. Other poems are repellent to people for superficial reasons, like a dislike for the complicated language or odd format that can be discovered on a surface read without attempting to search for meaning. It is for this reason I think that people’s opinions of poetry can change. At one point in their life they may not have the experience and insight to find the meaning in a poem, but revisiting it years or even just minutes later with a changed perspective can allow them to see the poem in a new light, with new appreciation.

Toni Morrison Repsonse

            The concept of having a work written about a targeted group of people, whether that be a certain race or gender, and still being universal is an interesting idea posed by the quote from Toni Morrison. I think the point Morrison is trying to illustrate is that when a work is centered around an often misrepresented grouping of people, in her case black people, is has a tendency to focus on explaining and justifying certain aspects of their life. In order for a wider audience to be able to relate, black authors feel responsible to cater to the knowledge and viewpoint of a non-black audience. However, Morrison believes that allowing her sincere perspective as a black woman to guide her writing, without wasting pages gentrifying her characters to make them appeal to every audience, she allows her characters to act naturally and the plot to develop around them. Through raw, honest portrayals of black life, she tells her story unapologetically. This draws in a diverse audience as instead of using sentences to explain what it means to be black, she highlights black life through action. A white reader could enjoy a novel written by Toni Morrison almost blindly, having race playing an intrinsic role as it is woven into the central being of each character rather than inserted in awkward explanations. The reader could sometimes forget the race of the characters, as it comes as a natural second nature to their existence.

Milkman's Memory of Mother

"'My mother nursed me when I was old enough to talk, stand up, and wear knickers, and somebody saw it and laughed and- and that is why they call me Milkman and that is why my father never does and this is why my mother never does, but everybody else does. And how did I forget that? And why?'" (78).

Milkman asks a very good question in the last sentence of this quote: why did he forget that his mother breasted him past the age when it was socially acceptable? When the incident of him being caught breast feeding occurring, he would've been old enough to remember it. It is clear in this quote he does remember, but that memory has been suppressed deep within his mind. Milkman clearly cares for his mother, enough to strike his father, risking being hit back harder himself.  Even at that young of an age, Milkman must've been able to recognize what was happening between his mother and himself was wrong and blocked the memory because it brought him embarrassment and shame. He knew the memory would make him look at his mother differently, for the worse, so he got rid of it as to allow himself to love her as a son should a mother. His father bringing up his mother's unnatural actions towards her own father forced Milkman to confront this memory and realize the unhealthy relationship Ruth has with not only her male family members, but perhaps an overall unhealthy relationship with sex.

Title

I predict that the title the Song of Solomon will become significant as the plot moves forward. I would like to do a follow up blog post after completing the novel to examine the true, intended significance of the title. However, I would also like to examine the title currently having only read the first four chapters of the book. Song is introduced within the first chapter with the mention of the italicized lyrics of the son about Sugarman flying home written out. The songstress behind this delivery is described as woman wearing a quilt in place of a winter coat, who can be assumed to be Milkman's eccentric aunt, Pilate. This song reappears in the second chapter when Pilate, Reba, and Hagar sing it for Milkman. Now the song lyrics are written out longer, as Milkman watches in amazement. Music often has a positive connotation, and in this case the sing almost seems a little magical as it enchants Milkman. Pilate represents a side of the Dead family Milkman can identify and bond with, unlike his own father from who he feels he could not be more different. Song in general, not specifically the Song of Solomon, seems tied to the women of the Dead family and a source of wonder for Milkman. In fact, the sound of Hagar's voice alone nearly makes Milkman faint because he has such a strong reaction to the power of the music.

Telling is Listening

     A major takeaway I received from this article, "Telling is Listening: Ursula K. Le Guin on the Magic of Real Human Conversation" by Maria Popova, was the idea that in a conversation communication is "intersubjective." It is interesting to analyze human conversation next to robot transmissions of modern technology. What makes human conversation so powerful is the continuous and natural flow between listening and speaking after being compelled by what was heard listening. This automatic, adaptive quality of speech isn't as regulated and black and white as the coding of technology.
      One thought I have about the article is that the author does not mention much about the power of silence. While she speaks about the significance of the sound of speech, she does not speak about the significance of the sound void of speech, or silence. Silence is a lack of sound, but when shared in a space between two people it can communicate something. Silence can indicate unfamiliarity among two people who do not have enough in common to speak or tension among two people who do not have the right words to speak. It would have been interesting to read a stance on silence and what that states about human communication.