Book review of Sula

Novel Review of 'Sula'
One of Morrison's better novels, definitely worth a peek..


The bond between the two central characters of Toni Morisson’s novel ‘Sula', illustrates the power of friendship in a period of oppression (domestic as well as public) and discriminatory forces, such as gender, economics and race. As girls, Sula and Nel find with-in each other a respite from the circumstances in which they live and are thus able to enjoy, rather than endure their childhood. ‘Because each had discovered years before that they were neither white nor male, and all freedom and triumph was forbidden to them, they had set about creating something else to be.’ However, as they progress into adulthood, the nature of their friendship changes dramatically.

From the point of Sula and Nel’s first meeting as twelve year-old girls, they become the best of friends, sharing in everything from perspective and curiosity to secrets and tragedy. Yet, their environment and experiences are where their few similarities begin and end as Sula and Nel are diametrically opposite.
Exciting and unpredictable, Sula lives life in pursuit of pleasure and self-gratification. She rebels against her community and makes no attempt to conform. Nel, quiet and obedient, provides a complete contrast, yet united the young women are able to ‘ create a single, complete individual.’ Their various households also provide complete parallels to their different personalities. Sula grows up in an immoral household which is unconventional, relaxed and in ‘throbbing disorder.’ Sula’s attitude towards sex ‘ pleasant and frequent, but otherwise insignificant’ is subsequent to her mother’s empowered, yet emotionless sexual relationships. Nel lives with-in immaculate walls of restriction and utter confinement. Nonetheless, they co-exist perfectly to the point where they are able to find solace within the other’s environments.

To an extent, the nature and upbringing of the young girls foresees the separate paths they choose later on in their lives. Sula renounces convention, tradition and society’s marginalisations by fleeing the community in search of freedom.Nel stays within the restricting wall of her environment and instead of seeking self-satisfaction, fulfills all of the roles expected of her.However, it is not in Sula’s departure,but rather in her return that marks the turning point in their complex and extraordinary friendship. Her arrival is ‘accompanied by a plague of Robins’ and seems to signal change and destruction from the very beginning. A wife and a mother, Nel has discovered an identity which is her own. Sula has struggled to find intimacy, stability and fulfillment and still needs Nel as much as before. Thus, it was not so much the distance but rather their distinct choices, to rebel and to conform, that drove them apart.
It was through their friendship that Nel and Sula are able to find an escape from their reality. It was their dependence on each-other that allowed them to compensate for each other’s limitations.Their bond superseded dissimilarity, distance and even death


----- L out