The Role Of Racism In Toni Morrison's Sula

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From the early 1900’s racism has been a huge issue in the United States. In the novel Sula, Toni Morrison connects racism to many different factors, one being frienship. Friendship gets people through the most difficult times in someone’s life and also celebrates the good times in someone’s life. However, there are negatives along with the positives in friendship. Friendship is an essential part in the novel Sula by Toni Morrison. Sula is about two colored girls, Sula and Nel,who were really close as young children. They shared everything with one another. They went through many things together, some good and some bad. The two characters, Nel and Sula, relate to each other many times in the novel due to racism. In the novel, we see how Sula and Nel connect as children and as adults. The two individuals became friends due to racism, and they always supported one another and learned to trust one another. Sula and Nel grew up in the Bottom, which was where all the colored people lived. In the 1900’s racism was a big issue. Sula and Nel were both the only child in their
Sula slept with many different men and some of them being white men, which people in the Bottom did not like. Although people of the Bottom kept away from Sula, Nel still went to visit Sula. When Sula got sick, Nel was the only one to go see her and see if she needed any help. Since the people of the Bottom found out Sula had slept with white men, they disliked her for that. The people of the town also did not bother to come visit Sula because she slept with their enemy, who treats colored people not as humans. As it states in the novel, “The death of Sula Peace was the best news folks up in the Bottom had had since the promise of work at the tunnel....some had come just to verify she had been put away.” (151). Even when Sula died people did not come to see her, no one felt grief. Everyone was happy that Sula was dead, only Nel was the one who felt

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