Jude and Ajax: Drawing a Picture of Masculinity in Sula

A foil character in literature is a character that shows opposite characteristics, in order to emphasize qualities of the other character. In Toni Morrison’s novel Sula, we see several examples of character foils. The main characters, Sula and Nel are foils of the other, two opposite halves that together make a whole. In another example, we have another set of foil characters; characters that are so different that together they tell what it is to be a man, and what it is to not be a man. Despite being secondary characters in the novel, when comparing and contrasting the characters of Jude and Ajax, a picture of the definition of masculinity is drawn in Toni Morrison’s book Sula.

The character of Jude is one of an inwardly emasculated man. He has a job as a waiter but it is not enough to support a family of his own. He desperately desires a construction job at the tunnel but cannot get one, and he feels less than a man because of this. Since he cannot get a man’s job to fulfil himself, he decides to get married: “So it was rage, rage and a determination to take on a man’s role anyhow that made him press Nel about settling down. He needed some of his appetites filled, some posture of adulthood recognized, but mostly he wanted someone to care about his hurt, to care very deeply” (82). He feels like the only way that he will be a man is to get married and have a female at his disposal, but he is also looking for a comforting mother figure as well. Jude wants a woman to complete him: “With her he was head of a household pinned to an unsatisfactory job out of necessity. The two of them together would make one Jude” (83). Jude’s attitude toward women is shown in his belief that women should be submissive: “He chose the girl who had alw...

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...abandoning his responsibilities or breaking any commitments. Ajax has nothing to prove to anyone that he is a man and makes his own choices without regard to what anyone says.

In Toni Morrison’s novel Sula, an evaluation of the two foil characters, Ajax and Jude, reveals that Ajax most closely represents masculinity while Jude represents an emasculated male. By comparing and contrasting Ajax and Jude, we can see what it is to be a man in the novel Sula. Unfortunately for the women in the novel, a sense of manhood for the men of the Bottom does not mean that the man would stay throughout the course of a relationship. The men in Sula are not men that respect relationships or family life. Manhood can be tied to marriage and jobs but it also goes beyond these external trappings. Real manhood requires self-assurance, confidence and an inner belief in one’s own worth.