Sula

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Sometimes life is full of challenges and miseries especially when you are faced by seemingly unbearable problems or circumstances and your only option is to take a drastic action and face your demons. Toni Morrison says,
“In much literature a woman’s escape from male rule led to regret, misery, if not complete disaster. I wanted to explore the consequences of what that escape might be, on not only a conventional black society, but on female friendship. In 1969, in Queens, snatching liberty seemed compelling. Some of us thrived; some of us died. All of us had a taste”(xvii).
Toni Morrison’s novel, Sula is the story of a strong and determined black woman who is face with the adversity and challenges in life
together with her unconventional family. It explores the bonds and tribulation they share with her family, friend and the community that they lived in. This is a fiction novel written by a Nobel Prize for Literature recipient, the story was told in view of the complexities of the experience of black women, womanhood, and race in the historical standpoint. The theme of the novel is being responsible for your own decision in overcoming life’s challenges by taking charge of your situation and the consequences it may bring. The narrator is describing the terrible and desperate situation that Shadrack is facing upon discharge from the Veteran hospital after the war.
He is frightened, very anxious, nothing in his possession, nobody with uncertain future ahead of him. For example, in the back of the wagon, on his way to Medallion, he is contemplating about the situation. The narrator says, “He knew the smell of death and was terrified of it, for he could not anticipate it. It was not death or dying that frightened him, but the unexpectedness of both. In sorting it all out, he hit on the notion that if one day a year were devoted to it, everybody could get it out of the way and the rest of the year would be safe and free. In this manner he instituted National Suicide Day (14). In other words, Shadrack believes that he has a control over death, the anxieties and uncertainties that goes along with it by setting aside a day to celebrate a rhetorical annual suicide day. This important because Shadrack thinks that by actively participating in the National Suicide Day, he is taking away the insecurities and making sure that the future comes along according to his plan. In conclusion, Shadrack is taking charge of his uncertain future, death and anxieties by celebrating a National Suicide Day once a year to ensure that the rest of the year will be free of these
worries. When Eva Peace, the matriarch of the family who is vibrant, tough and strong-willed black women grew impatient of her favorite child Plum; his life being in terrible state of addiction and desperation, swirling down into the darkest of oblivion. Eva took the matter into her own hands, after telling him about her love to her only son she pours kerosene onto his body while he is sound asleep and setting him ablaze. Eva says, “I had done everything to make him leave me and go on and live and be a man but he wouldn’t and I had to keep him out so I just thought of a way he could die like a man not all scrunched up inside my womb, but like a man” (72). In other words, Eva believes that Plum is living a life of misery and hopelessness and her impatience grew into exasperation. She thought that her son would be better of dying like a man than the state he is in right now. This is important because it shows Eva’s courage and unconventional thinking by putting his sons life into her hand. She believes that by doing so she is in control of this desperate situation and provided a better option for her son. In conclusion, Eva Peace believe that Plum is better of dying like a man than living a life of addiction, uncertainties and despair. She believes that she is in control of the situation by taking charged and changing the course of the future into certainty and freedom. Living a life the way you want it is liberating and gives you a sense of peace and contentment. When Nel visited Sula in her deathbed, they awkwardly discuss how their friendship went along. Nel is reluctant to consider sensitive matter but since the topic was brought up she gathered enough courage to discuss these things with her once best friend.
Dying. Just like me. But the difference is they dying like a stump.
Me, I’m going down like one of those redwoods.
I sure did live in this world. Really? What have you got to show for it?
Show? To who? Girl, I got my mind. And what goes in it.
Which is to say, I got me”. Lonely, ain’t it?
Yes.
But my lonely is mine. (143)
In other words, Sula is saying that she lives a life the way she wanted it. It might not be perfect, lonesome even but she did it herself and she owns everything in it. This is important because Sula has taken charged of her life and the situation she was in and do not blame anybody for this is what she is and proud of it no matter what the consequences it may bring. In conclusion, Sula faced her own demons by taking charged of her life situation and be proud of everything that goes along with it because she lives a life in her own way.
When Nel mustered the courage to confront Sula about her affair with her husband Jade. Nel asked Sula why she hurt her the way she did. Does their friendship matter at all? Sula answers back, “It matters, Nel, but only to you. Not to anybody else. Being good to somebody is just being mean to somebody. Risky. You don’t get nothing for it”(144-145). In other words, Sula is saying that whatever happens, happened for no reason at all. It bears no meaning to anybody unless you have personal motives that get along with it. This is important because it shows that in life, people do what they do because it matters to them but sometimes they do things just for the sake of doing it. The act only affects the person based on their personal perception, however taking responsibilities of the consequences of your actions in overcoming your challenges determine the kind of person you
are.
Works Cited
Morrison. Toni. Sula. New York: Vintage Books, 2004. Print.