Rethinking Initiation:A Comparative Study Of Female Protagonists In Toni Morrison’s Sula And God Help The Child

Toni Morrison,a leading figure in contemporary American literature,delineates the unique experiences of the black growing up in American society.By depicting the process of self-actualization of characters,Morrison creates a number of vivid black female characters.Among them,Sula is the model owing to her strong personality and rebellious spirit.Morrison’s attention to the initiation of black females also manifests itself in her latest work God Help the Child.Different from Sula（1973）which spans the period from 1919 to 1965,God Help the Child（2015）is set in contemporary America.By comparing Sula and God Help the Child,the thesis intends to explore Morrison’s initiation narrative strategies and their initiation in which Sula and Bride overcome traumatic girlhood to bloom into self-reliant womanhood.The main part of the thesis consists of three chapters.Chapter one deals with the predicaments confronted by Bride and Sula.Despite being divided by decades,the plights of the protagonists are not fundamentally different.Their quests of“who am I”have been under the pressures of family and society since their girlhood.Chapter two focuses on the initiation strategies of Sula and Bride.Sula’s wisdom and humor are potent weapons against white hegemony and the conventions of the black community.Her defiance expands the space of female self-development.With the help of white and black communities,Bride begins the real journey of self-discovery by virtue of reflection and communication.Chapter three treats the initiation narrative strategies that Morrison employs in the novels.Morrison relates the story of Sula through the combination of omniscient and figural narration and uses irony to reveal the maturity of Sula.In God Help the Child,the polyphonic structure and the elements of magical realism highlight the initiation of Bride.The differences of narrative strategies indicate Morrison’s insights on black female initiation.In conclusion,the comparison between Sula and Bride sheds light on the fact that for black women racial oppression and gender discrimination lurk in the path towards maturity,no matter it is the American society just going through WWI or that in the 21^stcentury and black family and black community have difficulty in supporting their initiation.More importantly,they surmount the strictures to move ahead.Morrison’s ingenious narrations of the fates of the two characters suggest the strengthening power of black females and her optimistic attitude towards their future.