On The Historical View In Toni Morrison's Literary Works

History and literature, which are closely related to each other, are both keys for an ethnic group to retaining its own identity and cultural independence. With the evolution of historical view, history discussed and represented in literary works varies accordingly, which in turn fosters the formation of new concepts of history. Among so many brilliant Afro-American writers, Toni Morrison, the Nobel laureate, is the one who is most concerned about historical narratives. In her novels, she has integrated a distinctive and profound historical view. Based on the studies on her novels, this paper intends to analyze Morrison's historical view from different perspectives. It is believed that by drawing upon the postmodern deconstructive thoughts and the Afro-American tradition we could gain a deeper insight into Morrison's historical view. Numerous studies have been conducted on Morrison's works, among which there are discussions about history in one or more than one books by Morrison. But few have analyzed Morrison's historical view in a thorough way. Therefore, it is both an experiment and a creation to observe Morrison's historical view form different perspectives. Besides, the author also examines Morrison's historical view in the tradition of Afro-American literature. By making a comparison between Morrison and a couple of prominent Afro-American writers in previous times, the author points out the inheritance and innovation in Morrison's historical view, which offers us a more profound interpretation of Morrison's works.The thesis consists of five parts, with the first part as an introduction and the last part a conclusion. The introductory part includes introduction to Morrison's life experience and the significance and originality the thesis.The main body of the thesis is divided into three chapters. The first chapter explores the development of Morrison's historical view. By observing how Morrison cites and incorporates historical materials in the novels, this part reveals the similarity between Morrison's historical view and the New Historicism. At the end of this part, it is pointed out that Morrison's historical view is creative and novel in that it is a hybrid view, influenced by both deconstructive thoughts and traditional Afro-American values.Chapter Two takes on the deconstructive perspective. In this chapter, the author emphasizes how Morrison deconstructs the grand narrative through the exposure of the relations between power and truth. Also included in this chapter are Morrison's employment of self-reflexive narrative in "writerly texts" and the deconstructive effects of myths and allusions.In Chapter Three, the author discusses how Morrison's historical view is influenced by the Afro-American tradition. The focus of this chapter is Morrison's emphasis on the importance of ancestors, inverted concept of time, magical and supernatural elements in her works as well as the employment of myths and folklores in her "speakerly texts". The relation between history and ancestors, oral tradition and time in Morrison's novels is covered here.Chapter Three will be a debate against Chapter Two in order to demonstrate that a single perspective is far from adequate to fully expound Morrison's hybrid new historical view. Finally, the conclusion is reached that Morrison's special identity as an African American and the specialty of the Black history account for the inconsistency in her hybrid view towards history. Her historical view is a mixture of postmodern deconstructive thoughts and Afro-American culture.