The American Family Life Depicted in Toni Morrisons and Jane Smileys - Essay Example

The American Family Life Depicted in Toni Morrison’s “Jazz” and Jane Smiley’s “A Thousand Acres”. of the Student: Professor: Date of Submission: The main purpose of the American Family is to bring about the happiness of each individual family member. The traditional family values include love and respect for parents, as well as for all members of the family”. The above comment depicts the situation of the American family values, in which the dominance or respect for the elderly person is an accepted one, provided the words of the elders prove to bring happiness to all the members of the family. Toni Morrison’s Jazz and Jane Smiley’s A Thousand Acres have been depicted with some of the traditional family values, however at the same time the less importance given to women in a male dominated society is also focused with high attention. The importance of sustaining the relationship with family members amidst controversial thoughts and other social issues is revealed in both the novels. For example, the life of Joe and Violet amidst Joe’s extra marital relationship with Dorcas and Ginny’s inability to face her father in spite of the sexual abuse shown by her father towards her and her first younger sister Rose reflects the above situation. “Jazz” is the popular-most novel of the renowned Afro-American writer Toni Morrison that won unabated fame as well as Noble Prize for the writer in the field of literature. Like other Morrison’s novels, Jazz also lays its concentration on the historical background and socio-cultural aspects of life of Black people of America, who have been got settled in America. The central theme of the novel seems to be personal, domestic and cultural memories. Morrison has structured her characters in Jazz from 1850s through 1920s chronicling the extended cultural responses to the eradication of slavery from different parts of the world. The novel discusses family life of the individuals belonging to different areas and professions, having two things in common i.e. race and social class. The novelist looks for the old traditional domestic life of Blacks where there was complete peace and harmony among the members of family. The novel is the reflection of feelings like care, love, sympathies and kindness she had observed in her own family life. Her novel also depicts to search out the same characteristics in contemporary American society. The novel deplores on the displacement of the members of one family reminding the time when the European nations made the poor Africans as captives to take them to Europe as slaves. No body in Africa could even resist all such atrocities due to the powerful imperialistic political set up then prevailing in the world. This concept had been transferred from one generation to the other, and the bitter taste of separation remained alive even after nearly three centuries have passed away since such incidents started happening. Morrison has tried to depict the image when there was exemplary tranquillity and harmony in family life. She has successfully portrayed the true picture of an ideal domestic life by indicating the flaws the contemporary American society undergoes. The absence of mother pr mama in her novels also contains abstract meanings; i.e. the Black African-Americans have to live far from Africa---their motherland. Both the major characters i.e. Violet and Joe seek escape from the bitter background. All the main characters including Joe, Violet and Dorcas, had lost their mother accidentally. Joe finds his lost mother in the person of Dorcas, while Dorcas is in search of her dead parents in Joe. There is conflict in relationship where every character is eager to find security and warmth that can only be found under the safe and sound protection the parents offer to their children. It had been the tradition of American society to give love and care to all the members of family. Family life, now in serious jeopardy with single parenthood and lot of insecurity, was once full of warmth and dedication. Every person including father, mother and children, maintain deepest feelings of affection and love for one another. Morrison seems to be fabricating the same strength in the domestic knot that had been the feature of American family life in past. The relationship between Joe, Violet and Dorcas is best illustrious of the above notion of a family life. As far as these three characters are concerned, they are devoid from the parental care and portrayed as being brought up without the parental care. Because of that Joe, Dorcas go in search of some one without prior intention to have a prolonged relationship, and Joe always trying to imagine a dreamy world, which has nothing of the sort of his present life. In the beginning of the novel the narrators’s comments reflects this aspect of expectation of a new way of life among the black community of America. “The narrator comments, “Im crazy about this City. Daylight slants like a razor cutting the buildings in half. In the top half I see looking faces and its not easy to tell which are people, which the work of stonemasons. Below is shadow were any blasé thing takes place: clarinets and lovemaking, fists and the voices of sorrowful women. A city like this one makes me dream tall and feel in on things. Hep. Its the bright steel rocking above the shade below that does it” [p-2]. Morrison’s narration is set during the period of reconstruction of the African American life. He seemed to have followed a different narrative style in which he probes deep into the life of Joe’s as well as Violet’s ancestors such as their parents and grand parents just to signify the fact that there has been a lot of difference in the earlier and the present life of the black Americans. The effect of racism on the history of African American community and their family values appears to be the target of the author. In one of the places the narrator says “What was I thinking of? How could I have imagined him so poorly? Not noticed the hurt that was not linked to the color of his skin, or the blood that beat beneath it. But to some other thing that longed for authenticity, for a right to be in this place, effortlessly without needing to acquire a false face, a laughless grin, a talking posture. I have been careless and stupid and it infuriates me to discover (again) how unreliable I am” shows the difference in the living condition of the African Americans in the past as well as the present from the perspective of the characters. Smiley, on the other hand is trying to depict a family life bound by the issues of respectability and dominance of the male in the society. “A Thousand Acres screamed to me from its cover that it was that kind of a book, that focused on the dissolution of the family as seen through a retelling of the King Lear story” observes Katxena [2007]. However, the family values are very well revealed through the reactions of the characters that belong to the same farming community. Many critics have observed A Thousand Acres as an illustration of a family story, and how much the importance of relationship and happiness means to a successful family. “It’s very easy to grasp the concept of these thousand acres, how much they mean to the family, and how tragic it is that this family cannot hold on to the land”. The “family farm” represents the concept of the importance given to family values. Classic story of American life. The very heart of what a thousand acres means to the family the father and the daughters” observes Berardinelli [1997]. The farm determines the relationship between the father and his three daughters, however certain negligence shown from the part of Cook’s character in terms of rash decisions and authority bring about drastic changes in the family. However, the family values are best expressed through the characters such as Ginny and Rose by means of suppressing the worst realities of their father who holds a respectable position in the society. The importance of economic status to maintain a position in the hierarchical family background is the key aspect, which is considered as the most important one by many characters such as Cook. “Thousand Acres covers a lot of ground, and raises numerous questions about the demons that some families keep buried. The land means many things in this film: a source of pride, a means of economic survival, a financial windfall, and, most importantly, a tool for revenge.” observes Berardinelli [1997]. Which means that how important is a family prestige to its members and how much they work to keep the evil side of the family as an unfoldable secret. The focus is on the Iowa farming community where families have known each other for generations; Ginny takes the role of looking at the farming lands in terms of not including any boundaries, the troubled relationship between Ginny and the various members of the family, the dangerous contamination of the entire community by their trouble are boosting features of the novel. Ginny’s role is one of the striking features of the novel, because the importance given to Ginny’s perspectives among the farming community is very less or in other words she is looked upon only as ignorant in the midst of a society dominated by male. The author has portrayed her character in such a way that Ginny is able to express her disagreement with the other male characters as a result she is commented as disrespectful member of the community and her thoughts remain inappropriate to others. This aspect of the novel reveals the American family value of respect for the elders in the family. Ginny says, “of course it was silly to talk about my point of view’. When my father asserted his point of view,, mine vanished” [Smiley p-176], she is referred to a “bitch”, “whore” etc as a result of her disrespect shown towards her father. The happiness of the family remains in the acceptance of what the elders of the family decides and the younger ones particularly women have no opportunity to reveal their opinion against that of the elders. This aspect is very well revealed through the words of Rose who says “When we are good girls and accept our circumstances, we’re glad about it…When we are bad girls, it drives us crazy”[ Smiley p-99]. The importance of social respectability felt by each character in this novel is yet another feature of the American family value, for example the way many of the characters reflect their concern towards preserving a social respectability than that of revealing their real inner life. The author focuses this aspect by commenting that “Most issues of the farm return to the issue of keeping up appearance” [Smiley p- 199] , which means that the hidden secrets of some of the respectable members of the farm might come out if the issues related to farm is revealed publicly. Ginny’s inability as well as reluctance to stand against her father is one of the best illustrations, which reflect the aspect of traditional American family value of respecting the elders. However, at the same time, the inabilities shown in women characters and the ready-made acceptance of Cook’s plans by the other members of the farming community show their irrational attitude towards the eldest of the community. Rose and Ginny are portrayed as having close relationship with one another, however Rose’s intension to punish her father for his sexual abuses reflected on her and Ginny when they were young makes her to take decisions against her father. Nevertheless, in actuality they try to hold this from their younger sister and other members of the community in order to maintain the respect of their family. At one place Rose says to Ginny “If you probe and probe and try to understand, it just holds you back” [Smiley p. 212], in which holding back means controlled by the aspect of respect of the family. Ginny observes, “Rose wouldn’t have stood for any sentimentality” [Smiley p. 62] which shows that Rose plans to react against their father reflects her intentions to cross the family sentiments. Overall both the novels depicts the American family values, however Jazz reflects that of the African American life, A Thousand Acres reflects that of the white Americans. REFERENCES Berardinelli, James [1997] “A Thousand Acres – A film review” Retrieved on 2007 fromhttp://www.reelviews.net/movies/t/thousand_acres.html Demirtürk, E. Lâle. (1997). Controlling the Images of Black Womanhood: The Contemporary African-American Womens Novel. Journal of American Studies of Turkey 5 (1997) : 69-80. Gale Thomas [2004] Contemporary Authors Online “Toni Morrison”. Online available from http://www.taftcollege.edu/newTC/Academic/INCO48/sec4-contempory_morrison.htm Katxena “A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley” Retrieved on 2007 March from http://www.engel-cox.org/2007/02/a_thousand_acres.html Morrison, Toni. (1992). Jazz Smiley, Jane. (1995). A Thousand Acres Read More