Top-Rated Free Essay
Preview

Sexual Theme in Sula by Toni Morrison

Good Essays
1027 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Sexual Theme in Sula by Toni Morrison
Toni Morrison doesn’t include a strong sexual theme in Sula just for shock value. Rather, the author uses sex to reveal clues towards the personalities of different characters, and how traits get passed down from one generation to the next. Some of the important clues provided in each characters personality traits come from differing sexual attitudes they hold. Disagreements between sexual appropriateness develop the relationship between Nel and Sula, as well as Sula’s broader relationship with the community of Medallion. The main source of conflict in Sula comes from the community’s strong sexual standards for men and women, which sets Sula apart from Nel, her family, and the community of Medallion. While women are expected to be subservient and devoted to their men, it is accepted in Sula for men to have affairs with other women and to leave their families behind for other pursuits. Both the Peace family and the Wright family are dominated by women, because of the lower standards for men to stay involved in their families lives. In the midst of an argument between Nel and Sula over her affair with Jude, Nel tells Sula to stop acting like a man. Sula responded by saying “Then I really would act like what you call a man. Every man I ever knew left his children” (143). This stereotype is true for many men. Even though Nel had a strong home life, her father was always away working and not very influential in her upbringing. Sula’s father Boyboy was even less involved in her life. Boyboy abandoned his wife and three children, forcing Sula to grow up in a home without a father. Many years later, when Sula sleeps with Nel’s husband Jude, Jude abandons the family leaving Nel with two young children. When Sula finally falls in love with Ajax, he leaves never to be heard again after Sula becomes too womanlike for him. Even for independent, strong women such as Hannah and Sula, they are expected to be subservient during sex. When Toni Morrison describes Hannah’s character, and her sexual openness, she also reveals an important sexual standard present. “While Eve tested and argued with her men. Leaving them feeling as though they had been in combat with a worthy, if amiable, foe, Hannah rubbed no edges, made no demands, made the man feel as though he were complete and wonderful just as he was – he didn’t need fixing – and so he relaxed and swooned in the Hannah-light that shone on him simply because he was” (43). Despite Sula’s untraditional sexual behaviors, during sex, she gave in to what was expected of women during intercourse. While the Peace family went against traditional sexual standards, Nel tended to be more traditional with it, especially with Jude. At Nel and Jude’s marriage ceremony, the couple anticipated having sex that night. “They began to dance, pressed in among the others, and each one turned his thoughts to the night that was coming fast” (85). This eagerness to have sex is more traditional, because we assume the eagerness comes from the fact that the two have never had sex. Society sets a standard that there should be no sex before marriage, sharply contrasting the role of sex in the Peace family. Sula’s sexual casualness conflicts with many marriages, and reveals the double standard for sex during marriage. When Sula sleeps with Nel’s husband she thinks little of it, but it has a profound impact on Sula’s live. Of course, it was hard for Sula to understand what was wrong with her affair “She had no thought at all of causing Nel pain when she bedded down with Jude” (119). Of course it leaves Nel feeling angry and depressed because of her husband and Sula’s affair. “For now her thighs were truly empty and dead too, and t was Sula who had taken the life from them and Jude who smashed her heart and the both of them who left her with no thighs and no heart just her brain raveling away” (111). Both Sula and Jude act as a man in the affair, since neither of them take blame or any responsibility. After the affair, it is a while before Nel even talks to Sula and the audience never hears from Jude again. When Sula, the independent and promiscuous protagonist falls in love for the first time with Ajax, she looses her “masculinity” by conforming to the sexual standard for women. After a positive sexual experience with Ajax, Sula began to act more traditionally to her gender, prompting Ajax to leave since he liked Sula because of her masculine attitude towards sex. “Every hackle on his body rose, and he knew that very soon she would, like all of her sisters before her, put to him the death-knell question “Where you been?” His eyes dimmed with a mild and momentary regret” (133). When Ajax mentions “all of her sisters”, we see that Sula is usually even more independent than her sexually independent family. Ajax is unsettled by Sula’s attempts to act more feminine, becoming uneasy looking at the gleaming kitchen, Sula’s green ribbon and the table for two. Ajax was just looking for sex, but the situation made him feel like he was being nested, taken in by Sula. Conforming to his own sexual standard, when too much was asked of him by Sula, he simply left without a word. Just as seen with Boyboy and Jude. Sula is simply a book about sex and its relationship with society. From it, we realize that little is expected from men in sex, and the women are much more responsible for their sexual behavior. It’s an unfair double standard, which rips characters apart. Nel and Sula, who go against the status quo to be independent of the sexual standards of society, both end up somewhat conforming to those standards. Sula’s sexual openness threatens the community of Medallion so much, that its citizens were happy when she died and stopped threatening their husbands. Though of course, if those wives would have been caught having an affair with different unmarried men, the story would have been much different.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The narrator, similar to the woman, highlights Helene’s insecurities. The narrator makes Helene hesitant to ask the women where the restroom was, this shows that she felt a lack of confidence with in herself. Helene’s hesitant action is evidence of the narrator’s diction. The narrator uses confusion and another character to foil Helene to see the truth of…

    • 350 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Nobody knew my rose of the world but me,,,I had too much glory. They don’t want glory like that in nobody’s heart”-The rose tattoo. The novel Sula starts off the book with this quote. The quote is a metaphor towards Sula's birthmark above her eye and her glory. Sula speaks her mind and does whatever she pleases. I enjoyed reading the novel because you see two different personalities come together. Nel is completely different from Sula. Nel was raised to be…

    • 247 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Beloved by Toni Morrison sets place in Ohio during the post-civil war era. Morrison publishes the novel in 1987 to remind the public of slavery in the United States. She implies that the past events also affect future events. Morrison dedicates the book to “Sixty Million and More” slaves. Similar to Beloved’s grave, the novel serves as a memorial to remember the black slaves in the United States.…

    • 281 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    In a fantasized world like The Odyssey, women can threaten the power of the patriarchy, but in a modernized world like The Catcher in the Rye, women cannot threaten men because they do not hold tangible power. In The Odyssey, women like Helen, have the capability and desire to gain power; Helen exemplifies how women can manipulate men through the use sexulaity to do anything desire, even start a war. Her power over these men not only causes death and destruction, but it also causes endless nights of men missing their wives and just longing for a woman. Unlike The Odyssey, The Catcher in the Rye presents models of women who appear subordinate to men. The average woman in the 1940’s cleans the house, cares for the children, and cooks the dinner. Her life is in the home, leaving her unable to gain power from men. The two situations contrast,…

    • 2216 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Sula came back accompanied by “plague of robin” in Medallion. She dressed in the manner of a movie star. When Eva saw Sula it was like when she saw worthless BoyBoy return, and being judgmental, why she didn't get married. She was furious the way Eva was criticizing her, she had to tell her to shut her her mouth. As a result, of that she told her, bad enough you cut off your own leg to collect insurance money. That doesn't give you the right to control other people life. Eva told Sula God is going to strike you, which one, the one who watched you burn Plum. Consequently, She was so scared that she locked her door at night. Surprisingly, later Sula have Eva committed to a nursing home, because she was her guardian, the whole community…

    • 361 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Turn of the Screw

    • 661 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The above example of the governess’s craving for Miles’s attention can be easily compared to the behavior exhibited by much of the female population today. Note that the woman is always seeking to please the man, and strives to satisfy and serve him. The attitude of women in the modern world is becoming more and more submissive; almost voluntarily.…

    • 661 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Only Daughter

    • 420 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In her short story, “Only Daughter” Sandra Cisneros portrays as the progressive, intelligent female in a male-dominated family and society. She considers herself deserving of the attention of her male superiors despite widespread sexism that reigns in her community. However, despite her said belief in the importance of a female’s education, Sandra is no empowered female, no feminist, and no independent women. In fast she is quite the opposite, enforcing the oppressive powers that restrain her by buckling under their weight.…

    • 420 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Sula Study Guide

    • 1916 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Sula is a novel about two childhood friends, Nel and Sula, set in a small town of Medallion, Ohio. Through the girls’ story, we are exposed to the complexities of modern life. To read this novel effectively, you must suspend judgment. Look at what the author is trying to say, read metaphorically, instead of literally. Because the novel is so short (174 pages) you need to read carefully.…

    • 1916 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Everything about the book feels forbidden, from the intense language to the plot itself. In “This Amazing, Troubling Book”, Toni Morrison recalls that she found the novel to be extremely uncomfortable and worrisome, but Morrison also states that she was without guidance the majority of these times. Without the guidance of a teacher the message of the book disappears in the controversy of it all. On their own, high schoolers will read this book and have the same reaction. Teaching this book to the students offers the guidance they need to understand such an important and relevant novel.…

    • 1447 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Though restrained by social convention, the passions of the female characters emerge with great force.”…

    • 867 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Yellow Wallpaper Identity

    • 876 Words
    • 4 Pages

    In asking these questions, Gilbert and Gubar categorize female writers as a subculture that, although determined to achieve the right to write about their own gender, is unable to break away from their role as dutiful wives. While the co-authors state that this inability stems from constant self-disparagement, it can also be determined that it stems from the nineteenth century's restrictive views on marriage.…

    • 876 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Slavery in the 19th century was a business like any other, and slave owners found that by treating slaves cruelly to increase productivity, their business became more financially productive and lucrative. Owners often employed rape as acts of cruelty to control slaves. Instead of being committed to achieve sexual satisfaction, rape is a form of assault performed by the perpetrator to establish a dominant position over another individual. In Toni Morrison’s novel, Schoolteacher’s nephews rape Sethe outside, behind the stable because “it was too nasty to stay in with the horses” (114). The nephews commit their “nasty” act to dehumanize Sethe instead of gaining sexual pleasure. By raping her and taking her milk in that setting, the nephews emphasize that she lower than the cow to them. This is an example of the recurring motif in the book of comparing slaves to animals in order to remove slaves’ autonomy and make them more obedient…

    • 710 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    As a result, Atwood’s portrayal of Gilead and the theme of women becoming sub-oppressors can be further analyzed beyond the fictional context of the book. As demonstrated above, the women in Gilead are oppressed by the established patriarchal societal structure and experience a loss of power. Although modern society is not an extremist patriarchy like Gilead, many elements that comprise a patriarchal structure are still apparent. For example, most CEOs and officials in authoritative positions are men. Since more men hold positions of leadership and power in comparison to their female counterparts, their values and viewpoints resonate throughout society. A prominent example of this is the portrayal of the physical qualities men find attractive in the opposite sex. The media perpetuates this ideal image of women in advertisements and television, further embedding it in society’s culture. This leads women to feel they need to possess the qualities depicted by the media in order to be attractive to men, and are “oppressed” by the expectations society, in particular men, have of them. Therefore, as in Gilead, modern women are oppressed by the patriarchal societal structure, although not to the same extent. By investigating the way women react to this oppression, one will notice many resemblances to the theme related in The Handmaid’s Tale. Nowadays, women are consumed by their appearances; they feel that in order to be accepted by society they need to maintain the desired image. Many women feel powerless over their bodies because they are enslaved by this ideal image, leaving them constantly dissatisfied with their bodies. However, rather than rebelling against this image that is rooted in pleasing men, women behave similar to Serena Joy and Aunt Lydia. In order to lift their…

    • 1436 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The American feminist writer, Kate Millet, once said that “We’re more sexually repressed than men, having been given a much more strict puritanical code of behavior than men ever have”. Throughout history, women have often been viewed as the “weaker” gender and have been expected to behave a certain way. Women are seen as submissive and docile because of societal expectations, these expectations eventually became the societal norm. This “norm”, according to Sigmund Freud, is the repression of several archaic and primitive desires. Females have often had to repress these desires more than males. Males have been the dominating species throughout history and have expected women to repress their nature. For the most part, females kept their place in society and played their role but there were some who broke the norm. There have been serious consequences for females who have attempted to liberate themselves, especially when they attempt to do so sexually. Females have the ability to achieve their sexual liberation despite the patriarchal societies in which they live. Two females which have attempted to achieve sexual liberation are Hester Prynne in The Scarlet Letter and Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar named Desire. Both Hester Prynne and Blanche Dubois’s attempts to achieve sexual liberation were hindered by the patriarchal societies in which they lived in; making only one of them successful.…

    • 4241 Words
    • 12 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    In this story, the author probes questionable societal norms that most people blindly followed, and still do. She dared to address taboo topics at a time when the role of women in society was extremely suppressed and inhibited and in days when women were not granted any degree of freedom.…

    • 394 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays