Possibility and A Mercy

IF 0.3 3区 文学 0 LITERATURE, AMERICAN
Michelle S. Hite
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Ignored in this inquiry, however, was the basic fact that conceptualizations of the postracial itself depended on the vocabulary and ecology of race and its attendant structures of meaning, which constrains possibilities for imagining the very new world order being suggested. To understand this critique, one of Morrison's famous passages on race, this one delivered to her 1975 Portland State audience, may be helpful:</p> <blockquote> <p>The function, the very serious function of racism … is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being. … Somebody says your head isn't shaped properly so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Somebody says you have no art, so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdom, so you dredge that up. None of this is necessary. There will always be one more thing.</p> (\"Portland State\" 35:55) </blockquote> <p>Distraction can easily be regarded as constitutive of race for Morrison, since she contends that greed explains its invention more than a belief in the inherent inferiority or inhumanity of Black people (\"Portland State\" 33:48). <em>A Mercy</em> suggests that moving beyond the racial hierarchy requires turning toward the nation's prehistory and so before possibilities for expressions of human personhood were reduced to racial inevitabilities.</p> <p>In an interview with Charlie Rose, Morrison offers that in <em>A Mercy</em>, she reached the heights—that in \"some respects she's never been better\" as a novelist (\"Interview\" 1:40). The research into the landscape and the laws <strong>[End Page 129]</strong> that enabled her to realize the integrity of the characters' voices yielded this declaration. In addition to accepting Rose's suggestion that <em>A Mercy</em> serves as a \"prequel to <em>Beloved</em>\" (2:58), Morrison also describes it as \"preracial\" in that it occurs \"before it all got institutionalized; when everybody was for sale and for rent … whites, mixed, everything. And slavery itself was this universal thing; and there was no nation, no empire that did not rest on it whether it was Egypt, or Athens, or Moscow\" (3:09, 3:15) In responding to Rose's claim that, like <em>Beloved</em>, the story centers on a Black, female child to which Morrison accepts and describes focusing on that age as a \"rich field to talk about\" because \"that's where you're vulnerable and imaginative\" (4:14, 4:10). Importantly, Floren's journey and her evolution parallel the country's changing, and so, as Rose notes, the period of <em>A Mercy</em> is \"America before it was America\" (5:56). Morrison agrees and adds that this period marked a time when \"America\" was, \"in flux, ad hoc—anything could have happened. … It was young, and kind of scary, and there was so much promise. And you want to know what were these [ordinary] people running from\" (6:03). The ordinary people in this period were important for Morrison's own, long-standing reflections on race because they existed during an actual time in the nation's history when personhood could be experienced without an appeal to racial hierarchy.</p> <p>Morrison carefully outlines her ambitions to move within the realm of the human in her essay \"Home,\" where she outlines the problem by suggesting that race lacks meaning despite its articulation through a socioeconomic public sphere. Importantly, for Morrison, race constrains. It limits the imagination and has such thoroughly entrenched meaning that possibilities for going beyond them appear messianic, ethereal, superhuman, and idealistic. 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引用次数: 0

Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

  • Possibility and A Mercy
  • Michelle S. Hite (bio)

Toni Morrison's novel A Mercy (2008) appeared in the marketplace within the context of Barack Obama's 2008 presidential election. Given this context, interviewers were interested in the novel's preracial context as directly tied to the suggestion of the postracial world order used to shape conversations following Obama's election. Specifically, they wanted to know from Morrison how much the possibilities of Obama's postracial era recalled or could recall the preracial antecedent one that Morrison claims for A Mercy. Ignored in this inquiry, however, was the basic fact that conceptualizations of the postracial itself depended on the vocabulary and ecology of race and its attendant structures of meaning, which constrains possibilities for imagining the very new world order being suggested. To understand this critique, one of Morrison's famous passages on race, this one delivered to her 1975 Portland State audience, may be helpful:

The function, the very serious function of racism … is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being. … Somebody says your head isn't shaped properly so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Somebody says you have no art, so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdom, so you dredge that up. None of this is necessary. There will always be one more thing.

("Portland State" 35:55)

Distraction can easily be regarded as constitutive of race for Morrison, since she contends that greed explains its invention more than a belief in the inherent inferiority or inhumanity of Black people ("Portland State" 33:48). A Mercy suggests that moving beyond the racial hierarchy requires turning toward the nation's prehistory and so before possibilities for expressions of human personhood were reduced to racial inevitabilities.

In an interview with Charlie Rose, Morrison offers that in A Mercy, she reached the heights—that in "some respects she's never been better" as a novelist ("Interview" 1:40). The research into the landscape and the laws [End Page 129] that enabled her to realize the integrity of the characters' voices yielded this declaration. In addition to accepting Rose's suggestion that A Mercy serves as a "prequel to Beloved" (2:58), Morrison also describes it as "preracial" in that it occurs "before it all got institutionalized; when everybody was for sale and for rent … whites, mixed, everything. And slavery itself was this universal thing; and there was no nation, no empire that did not rest on it whether it was Egypt, or Athens, or Moscow" (3:09, 3:15) In responding to Rose's claim that, like Beloved, the story centers on a Black, female child to which Morrison accepts and describes focusing on that age as a "rich field to talk about" because "that's where you're vulnerable and imaginative" (4:14, 4:10). Importantly, Floren's journey and her evolution parallel the country's changing, and so, as Rose notes, the period of A Mercy is "America before it was America" (5:56). Morrison agrees and adds that this period marked a time when "America" was, "in flux, ad hoc—anything could have happened. … It was young, and kind of scary, and there was so much promise. And you want to know what were these [ordinary] people running from" (6:03). The ordinary people in this period were important for Morrison's own, long-standing reflections on race because they existed during an actual time in the nation's history when personhood could be experienced without an appeal to racial hierarchy.

Morrison carefully outlines her ambitions to move within the realm of the human in her essay "Home," where she outlines the problem by suggesting that race lacks meaning despite its articulation through a socioeconomic public sphere. Importantly, for Morrison, race constrains. It limits the imagination and has such thoroughly entrenched meaning that possibilities for going beyond them appear messianic, ethereal, superhuman, and idealistic. Morrison suggests that a more useful metaphor for realizing earthly conditions without racism would be "home" because making it is a "manageable, doable, modern human activity" ("Home" 4). In this way, "home" as...

可能性与仁慈
以下是内容的简要摘录,以代替摘要: 可能性与《仁慈》 米歇尔-S-海特(简历 托尼-莫里森的小说《仁慈》(2008 年)是在奥巴马 2008 年总统大选的背景下出现在市场上的。在这种背景下,采访者对小说的前种族背景很感兴趣,因为这直接关系到奥巴马当选后用来塑造对话的后种族世界秩序的暗示。具体来说,他们想从莫里森那里了解奥巴马的后种族时代的可能性在多大程度上唤起或能够唤起莫里森声称的《怜悯》的前种族时代。然而,这一探究忽略了一个基本事实,即后种族的概念化本身依赖于种族词汇和生态学及其附带的意义结构,这限制了想象所建议的新世界秩序的可能性。要理解这一批判,莫里森关于种族问题的一段著名论述或许会有所帮助,这段论述是她在 1975 年向波特兰州立大学的听众发表的: 种族主义的功能,非常严重的功能......就是分散注意力。它让你无法工作。它让你一遍又一遍地解释你存在的理由。......有人说你的脑袋形状不对,所以你让科学家们去研究它。有人说你没有艺术,你就把它挖出来。有人说你没有王国,你就把它挖出来。这些都没有必要。总会有更多的东西。(波特兰州》35:55)在莫里森看来,分心很容易被视为种族的构成因素,因为她认为贪婪比相信黑人天生低劣或不人道更能解释分心的产生(《波特兰州》33:48)。梅西》认为,要超越种族等级制度,就必须追溯国家的史前史,在人类人格表达的可能性被归结为种族必然性之前。在接受查理-罗斯的采访时,莫里森表示,在《怜悯》中,她达到了一个高度--作为一个小说家,"在某些方面,她从未如此出色"("采访 "1:40)。对风景和法律的研究 [第129页完] 使她能够实现人物声音的完整性,这也是她做出这一声明的原因。除了接受罗斯关于《怜悯》是"《挚爱》前传"(2:58)的建议外,莫里森还将其描述为 "前种族 "作品,因为它发生在 "一切都被制度化之前;那时,每个人都可以出售和出租......白人、混血儿,什么都有。莫里森在回应罗斯的说法时说,与《心爱的人》一样,这个故事的中心是一个黑人女性儿童,莫里森对此表示接受,并称关注这个年龄段是 "一个可以谈论的丰富领域",因为 "那是你脆弱和富有想象力的地方"(4:14, 4:10)。重要的是,弗洛伦的心路历程和她的演变与美国的变迁并行不悖,因此,正如罗斯所言,《怜悯》的时代是 "美国成为美国之前的美国"(5:56)。莫里森同意这一观点,并补充道,这一时期的 "美国""处于变化之中,任何事情都有可能发生。......它很年轻,有点可怕,但又充满希望。你想知道这些(普通)人在逃避什么"(6:03)。这一时期的普通人对于莫里森本人长期以来对种族问题的思考非常重要,因为他们存在于美国历史上一个真实的时期,在这个时期,人们可以体验到人格,而无需诉诸种族等级制度。莫里森在《家》一文中仔细勾勒了她在人的领域内活动的野心,她在文中指出,尽管种族通过社会经济公共领域得以表达,但它缺乏意义。重要的是,对莫里森来说,种族是一种束缚。它限制了想象力,具有根深蒂固的意义,以至于超越它的可能性显得弥赛亚式的、虚无缥缈的、超人的和理想主义的。莫里森认为,"家 "是实现没有种族主义的世俗条件的一个更有用的隐喻,因为建立家是一项 "可管理、可实现的现代人类活动"(《家》第 4 章)。因此,"家 "作为...
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来源期刊
EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE
EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE LITERATURE, AMERICAN-
CiteScore
0.30
自引率
33.30%
发文量
62
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