Friday, November 13, 2015

Sing Your Heart Out Kookie

Many characters in the novel are portrayed in a sympathetical view. Many might be wondering how in the world are people who sexually abuse and rape others sympathetic? It would only make sense to perceive these individuals as "bad" and a shame to society. Characters such as Cholly Breedlove and Soaphead Church please themselves by raping others who they think have no power over their bodies. They feel sudden urges of power and take action over the women's/children's bodies. "When Cholly was four years old, his mother warpped him in two blankets and one newspaper and placed him on a junk heap by the railroad"(Morrison 132). Toni Morrison might be conveying that even characters like Cholly and Soaphead can be sympathetically viewed by throwing the given out that when they were young kids, they felt no love or compassion in their lives. One must grow up with strong love and protection from his/her parents in order to grow up and face the world with reasonable actions. Cholly had no mother and his father was not there for him. Soaphead lost his mother and his father was "a schoolmaster known for the precision of his justice and the control in his violence"(Morrison 169). Each character faced hardships at a certain point in time of their early stages in life. The coldness and love that they missed out on is most likely the reason why they make such irrational decisions in life. This brings out the importance of love that each child needs in order to become a "fruitful" person in the future. 

They had no "voice" or say in things and this led these characters to keep holding in all the comments and thoughts in their heads of whatever the situation was. They had none to a limited amount of people in their community to share or express feelings with. All these compilations of thoughts in mind that couldn't be expressed are all thrown out as rage and sexual violence to others. After a long long time of compressing their feelings, their voice had a significant loss in life. Once they became adults, they acted out in disturbing ways to let out all the frustration and anger that they carried along with them in life for the past years of life.
Cholly didn't have the opportunity to experience the true "happiness" and peaks of life as a child

3 comments:

  1. Michelle I have to commend you on this. Talking about rape is a hard thing, even more so talking about it the way that you did. However, I think that this is exactly what Toni Morrison wanted. The feelings of empathy really help to trace racism as the root of all evils! Thanks for sharing your thoughts for me to read, can't wait for what's to come!

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  2. Your thoughts are very accurate. The way one is treated really does dictate much of how one will act/treat another. I, much like you, felt great sympathy for poor Cholly and Soaphead, but yet at the same time I shame myself for even the littlest pity I do have. I don't think rape is a justified action and I hate to be the reader that feels the pity Morrison doesn't want me to feel. At this point as a reader I can only feel hopeless about the topic.
    After reading your blog post, that is exactly how I felt.
    Great job writing these thought in words. Looking forward to the next post!

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  3. It really makes you wonder about perspective, huh? Even the worst people may not be entirely despicable, it may just be due to childhood treatment or circumstances, which limits their thinking as they grow up. Great job with this post!

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