nrossi5345
New member
Hi guys, I need help on adding my commentary, other ideas, and referring to specific events, details, and quotes for this commentary on one main idea of the book.
"Pilate can reproduce her original family no more successfully than can Macon. Her family exposes her imbalanced character just as Macon's family reflects his.(11) Her inability to understand the past's weight on her own spirit, an inability that jeopardizes her own family's welfare, is symbolically expressed by Pilate's failure to understand her dead father's cryptic messages. Just as she cannot understand that she carries the dead weight of her father's bones, she fails to understand fully how the loss of Lincoln's Heaven - the dead weight of her own past - has helped shape her treatment of Reba and Hagar. Like her mother, Reba cares nothing for property or possessions. Reba magnifies the destructive aspect inherent in Pilate's self-denial by allowing herself to be exploited by nameless lovers; in the text, moreover, she seems a nullity, "vacuous" (46), lacking characterization or development. But it is Pilate's granddaughter Hagar, losing her own identity to Milkman's sexist whims, who suffers the fatal consequences of Pilate's original loss. "What," Guitar wonders, "had Pilate done to her?" (307). As if in answer to Guitar's unspoken query, Morrison writes, "all they knew to do was love her" (308). Their devotion, however, is another form of 'anaconda love.'"
help would be much appreciated
"Pilate can reproduce her original family no more successfully than can Macon. Her family exposes her imbalanced character just as Macon's family reflects his.(11) Her inability to understand the past's weight on her own spirit, an inability that jeopardizes her own family's welfare, is symbolically expressed by Pilate's failure to understand her dead father's cryptic messages. Just as she cannot understand that she carries the dead weight of her father's bones, she fails to understand fully how the loss of Lincoln's Heaven - the dead weight of her own past - has helped shape her treatment of Reba and Hagar. Like her mother, Reba cares nothing for property or possessions. Reba magnifies the destructive aspect inherent in Pilate's self-denial by allowing herself to be exploited by nameless lovers; in the text, moreover, she seems a nullity, "vacuous" (46), lacking characterization or development. But it is Pilate's granddaughter Hagar, losing her own identity to Milkman's sexist whims, who suffers the fatal consequences of Pilate's original loss. "What," Guitar wonders, "had Pilate done to her?" (307). As if in answer to Guitar's unspoken query, Morrison writes, "all they knew to do was love her" (308). Their devotion, however, is another form of 'anaconda love.'"
help would be much appreciated