The Southern Geographical Space And Political Imagination In Tony Morrison's Novels

Geographical space in literary works is a component that contains subjective emotional experience.It is closely related to the deep power structure and political ecology of society.African-American literature presents a remarkable characteristics of geographical writing.The works of different periods demonstrate their own geographical landscapes accordingly.As one of the most important contemporary African-American writers in the United States,Toni Morrison's works are full of imagination about the southern part of the United States,which is different from the narrative of fleeing the South in early African-American literary works.The south is portrayed as a symbolistic harbor for African-American culture,which promote black people's identity.Morrison's southern geospatial writing revises and supplements the imaginative presentation of white literary works on the southern geospatial space.And the writing also shows her views on historical encounters of black people and their contemporary predicament.Morrison's early novels are nurtured from historical and cultural environment of the American Feminist and the Civil Rights Movement in the 1970s.The works probe into physical practice and racial identity of black youth in south.Their behavior can be viewed as cultural "experience".In Sula,three generations of women in the Peace family break through the deep power structure in Medellin through personal physical practice,and achieve their subjectivity from different levels.Due to class transformations,the black youth living in the northern city in Song of Solomon lose his racial identity and faith.Later,he regains national cultural identity by living in south.The southern countryside shows many traces of African and American "presence",though backward and poor,it is rejuvenated because of African-American traditional culture.It becomes a symbolical spiritual home of African Americans,which set the tone for the southern geospatial narrative afterwards.History Trilogy mainly uses memory as means to illustrate African Americans'efforts to gain freedom and build their homes around the Civil War and the Reconstruction of the South.The characters in Beloved revisit the memory of "Sweet Home" in southern plantation,which confirms their former slave status.The ghosts break through the boundaries of life and death,thus the past reappears and affects people's life constantly.To some extent,the "forest glade" ceremony alleviates the trauma of black people,but it's still a long way to get free.The narrative reveals that only by confronting the painful memories of slavery can the black people achieve real liberation.Paradise shows the desire of African Americans for home,and exhibits their efforts on it in south.Haven is a closed all-black-people village in Oklahoma,and maintains a short-lived pre-modern society.Its successor,Ruby,is involved in modernization process.The tradition is ruined by the color politics and intergenerational transformation in village.To some extent,the Convent is a political model of integration of racial equality,and it conveys the writer's political views on black people's ideal home.At the end of the 20th century,globalization and nationalism boom because of economic prosperity and the loosening of international political environment,which lead to diversification of politics and culture.And thus,the theme of literary works is further expanded.Morrison's attention to this phenomenon is reflected in her novels of different periods,and the works can be regarded as the part of "Beyond the South." Tar Baby emphasizes the relationship between the flowing geography and cultural identity.The protagonist experienced the dislocation and reconstruction of cultural identity.The southern village,could still not change her fate of the "outsider".Eventually,she goes to Europe and her identity roams.A mercy is published before Barack Obama take office.The novel describes the ethnic landscape of Virginia during the colonial period and exhibits the process of racist production.White European immigrants are "abandoned children" and become "owners" later in the Americas.Indians become "native homeless people",while African black slaves are alienated.The corresponding laws are simultaneously produced,which resulting in a deep-rooted race problem in the Americas.The stories still take place in south and presents a continuation of precious style on southern imagination established in Song of Solomon.While,the narrative in the two novels clearly transcends the region itself and tends to be more ambitious.Compared with the small villages in south,cities are the product of the modernization process in north.The introduction of metropolis in Morrison's novels reflect her concern on the fate of urban blacks.Because of the two waves of immigration,African-Americans' life are changed deeply.Blacks in northern cities are facing strong cultural shocks.Jazz represents this historical situation.On one hand,as the soul of blue,jazz appears some kind of lust because it's combined with the outstanding spirit of the era.On the other hand,jazz also presents serious and sad aesthetic characteristics due to black people's southern experience.Urban blacks use jazz to bridge the above breaks.Home shows the fate of blacks in the 1950s on the theme of war and racial persecution.The protagonists are traumatized by war and racial discrimination,while are cured later by going back to their home in south.The southern village is once again become a Utopia for contemporary blacks.To sum up,black people in the two novels show their attitude towards the dilemma of modern society——returning to the symbolic south for redemption.It can be said that this practice on geographical space imagination reflects writer's view on modernity,and it is also a kind of return to her early works.Morrison's imaginative portrayal of the south actually contains a deep political appeal,which is always closely related to the situation of black people in the United States.The fictional south,on one hand,is the place their ancestor had ever lived,in which their descendants can get some historical legitimacy in the status of depressed "presence";On the other hand,and more importantly,the south is symbolically become spiritual home of African Americans.This kind of home encourages black people to deal with the current plight and to get more chance on politics in future.