Sula Literary Analysis

Rachael Amede

Mrs. Greco

AP Literature and Composition

7/15/16

Sula

Historical information: African American were fighting in World war 1, but none of the black veterans were treated with respect.The Chicago race riots were also ensue

Biographical information: She won the Pulitzer Prize for her novel Beloved. In 1993, Morrison became the first African-American woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. Sula is also her second novel.

Characteristic of the genre: Sula is a novel. The novel genre include a long, fictional story comprised of characters, events and actions that have a definite beginning and an eventual end.

Plot summary: The book follows a friendship of two black women Sula and Nel over almost 45 years. The friendship

begins in about 1921, and goes on through high school and until Nel’s marriage to Jude. Sula leave for ten years and then returns. The two women reunite as they never left each other. However Nel ends up catching Sula and Jude in an affair. Jude and Sula eventually leave town together, but Sula returns to Medallion alone. Their friendship becomes weak over the next three years. Later it is known that Sula is dying and she askes Nel to forgiver her. Although through the sickness Nel refuses. After the death of Sula, Nel realized how much she missed her old friend. The book also follows the bond of a community that was so close and eventually separates overtime.
Author's style: The authors style is very detailed and straight forward
An example: "But they had been down on all fours naked, not touching except their lips right down there on the floor where the tie is pointing to, on all fours like (uh huh, go on, say it) like dogs. (180)
Memorable quotes:
Symbolism
“accompanied by a plague of robins, Sula came back to Medallion”(17).It symbolizes the narrow-minded way the people of Bottom think. They are like a flock of bird that stay together and have the same way of thinking but are plagued because of their unwillingness to be open to different opinion and ways of living.
Repetition
They had looked at the world and back at their children, back at the world and back again at the children..."(122). The reputation occurs when they say back at the world twice. it helps convey the emotion of the scene.
Paradox
"Sula stepped off the Cincinnati Flyer into the robin shit and began the long climb up into the Bottom" (90).

It is a paradox because the Bottom is on a hill. Although it being on a hill it is described as a terrible place to live more like a hole the something prestige of that belongs on a hill.

Personification

"A ball of muddy strings, but without weight, fluffy but terrible in its malevolence"(109). Malevolence is to wish evil on to others, but a ball of muddy string can not think let alone wish

"Pain took hold"(203). Sula describes pain to that of a person who is holding her down. That is impossible seeing pain is just a feeling.

"...pain bored her and there was nothing to do, for it was joined by fatigue..."(203). Even though fatigue can't be felt along with other feeling, it cannot join in because that is giving it a human characteristic.

"...and wash her tired flesh always"(205). Flesh can't be tired. A person can feel tired.

"a crease of fear touched her breast..."(205). Fear is also an emotion it cannot physically touch a person

"The rumor that the tunnel spanning the river would use Negro workers beacame an announcement"(207). A tunnel made out of cement cannot use anyone for anything but ca nbe used by human

people
Metaphor
"she tried concentrating on the throbs, identifying them as waves, as waves, hammer strokes, razor edge or a small explosions"(203).

She compares the pain she is feeling to relatable thing people know of

"for any second there was sure to be a violent explosion in her brain..."(205). She compares the pain in her head to an explosion to create a visual of what her pain was like

Foreshadow

"Sula would come by of an afternoon, walking along with her fluid stride, wearing a plain yellow dress the same way her mother, Hannah, had worn those too-big house dresses - with a distance, an absence of a relationship to clothes which emphasized everything the fabric covered." This foreshadows how Sula becomes like Hannah. By the end of the book she would be sleeping with married men, and have a fleeting attitude.

Imagery

“Sula was a heavy brown with large quiet eyes, one of which featured a birthmark that spread form the middle of the lid toward the eyebrow, shaped something like a stemmed rose” (52). This creates a visual of the character Sula.

Simile

"First fluttering as of doves in her stomach..."(203). She compares the flutter using as to doves who

flutter

Characters: Sula Peace - One of the main characters. In the book Sula can be very bold, complicated and individualistic. She is very hard to understand her action at times and she has a presence that gives off that she doesn’t need anyone else.
Eva Peace - Grandmother of Sula. She was left by her husband. She comes off as heartless, cold, and straightforward.
Hannah Peace - Hannah Peace is Eva's oldest child. She moves back in with her mother after her husband died. She is very sensual, fleeting, and carefree.
Nel - She is the daughter of Helene and Sula best friend. Nel marries Jude, and is later abandoned by him. Nel is simple, straightforward and moralistic. Nel doesn’t need much in her life as seen with the life with her husband. She also has high moral for she does not forgive Sula.
Settings: Takes place in the Bottom which is a place inside the town of Medallion, Ohio. The residents of the Bottom are African-American and have to deal with constant discrimination and racism. The Bottom sits above a valley of white people, however there is little interaction. Takes place during Jim Crow laws and segregation. Irony
The setting of the Bottom actually over looks the white community as if they were superior to whites.
Symbols:
Fire: Fire represent a type of cleansing in Sula. Although when fire is mentioned in the book someone is usually dying. For Plum when he was soaked in the kerosene he felt like he was getting babtized or cleanse. However, for Hannah it was more of a cleansing for Sula. It was like she was washing away someone of the hatred in her life.
http://www.litcharts.com/lit/sula/symbols/the-plague-of-robinsThe Plague of Robins: It symbolizes the narrow-minded way the people of Bottom think. They are like a flock of bird that stay together and have the same way of thinking but are plagued because of their unwillingness to be open to different opinion and ways of living.
Water: Unlike fire, water in the this book symbolizes death. When Sula is thinking about water she thinks of Chicken's death and get uneasy about that day.
Possible Themes
Friendship: the book focuses on the bond of friendships and the limits of them. How friendship can withstand the sands of time and how the can be dismantled through betrayal.
Gender: Gender is a theme that is challenge by characters like Hannah and her daughter Sula. Women like them were opposite the stereotypical woman in the book; Married, with children and a husband who cheats. They are free with their sensuality and opinions.
Loyalty: The book also doesn’t focus on the bond between friendships but all types of relationship or the lack of. The loyalty of friendship is put into question because of the affair between Sula and Jude. Loyalty of a Marriage between Nel and Jude, Eve and BoyBoy. Lastly the loyalty between a mother and her child.
Importance of opening scene: Shadrock coming home from the horrors of war on him by the end of the boo shows that a person doesn’t have to go out into a far land to see horrors happening they could be happening in their own town.
Importance of ending scene; their importance of the last scene teach the reader to not dwell on their hatred because it will but grief on their heart. Nel spent all this time not forgiving Sula putting all this pain on herself. It shows that grudges are not worth especially for a friendship that lasted as long as theirs.