Periodization as Metaphor: Transcending Time in Toni Morrison’s Sula and “Recitatif”

Abstract

Abstract: Toni Morrison spoke and wrote extensively about the primacy of the art of creating fiction, resisting any critical, academic, or social attempts, however well-intentioned, to categorize her texts and wrest their autonomy. Implicit in periodization, one such “lazy labeling” strategy long embraced by critics and pedagogues, is a power dynamic that diminishes the artist, her art, and the reader’s experience of both. This discussion of two related works by Morrison, Sula and “Recitatif,” contextualizes her aesthetic theory by closely examining her defiance of conventional norms for narrative structure, character delineation, and even setting description. As both narratives trace their respective protagonists’ lifelong journeys, which propel forward and revert to earlier times to attain truth, Morrison exposes the mendacity of a singularly linear progression of finite time periods. This consideration of Sula and “Recitatif” focuses on the texts as models of Morrison’s insistence upon connection, ambiguity, and circularity in fiction. As metaphorical argument for a literary canon that transcends classification by time periods or any other limiting, arbitrarily prescribed criteria, Morrison’s narratives resonate timelessly.