African American Christian Spirituality In Paradise

Toni Morrison is the first African-American writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature and has published nine famous novels until now.In Toni Morrison's mind, Christianity is a theatrical religion,inclusive of everything,so she usually creates her work within the larger framework of American culture,the new identified Christianity including western Christian traditions and African traditions.By describing two contrasting communities' seeking of the paradise,the novel Paradise(1998) especially reflects Morrison's exploration of Christian spirituality.This thesis reads Toni Morrison's novel Paradise in African Americans' religious understanding of Christianity,African American Christian spirituality.Chapter One gives a general introduction to Toni Morrison's achievement on literature,the literary criticism on her work and the religious influence on Toni Morrison.Chapter Two clarifies the essence of African American Christian spirituality and its development in the religious practices by the Black Church.Chapter Three analyzes Paradise in African American Christian spirituality to explore the paradise in Toni Morrison's mind. Chapter Four is the conclusion.Through the development of the black town from Haven to Ruby and the development of the Convent,Toni Morrison reveals the corruption of a black utopian dream,which gradually goes astray from the essential Christian spirituality and protrays an earthly paradise in African American Christian spirituality.The author of the thesis closely reads Paradise,seeks out the exclusive aspects of Christianity that Morrison intends to criticize and explores the true Christian spirituality she wishes to deliver.