What I Found Interesting in Song of Solomon

Throughout the Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison conveys a mass amount of detail and description in such a way that the reader is forced to analyze all the content to find the hidden clue and understand the deeper meaning. It was interesting to me how she represented what America was to blacks and the underprivileged at the time. The hospitals and snow, “both white,” “red velvet rose petals,” and “wide blue wings,” all are meant to represent the American flag (Morrison 5,6). As Mr. Smith dies, a woman goes into labor; symbolizing for life to begin, death must happen first. Ultimately, although I was originally confused with why Mr. Smith’s character was even introduced, I later understood that at the time, blacks only had a limited amount of “freedom” among them, and they had to sacrifice whatever they had to get more. I also found the list of names particularly interesting. Morrison went down the family line, and repeated Dead after the names. As we read aloud the list in class, instead of hearing [name] Dead, I began to hear [name], Dead; as if Dead was used to describe the person and the life they lived. Although most of those characters aren’t actually dead, the lifestyle they live is somewhat dead, as Macon II does not care about anything except wealth, Milkman could not care less when his mother was being strangled in the garden, and Ruth tries to please herself through unconventional methods and intentionally angers her husband all because her life in general is misery.