Toni Morrison uses obvious symbols in her novels Song of Solomon, Beloved, and The Bluest Eye. She uses obvious symbols so the reader is able to catch on to them quickly, helping them understand the meaning of the novels. In Song of Solomon, the three main symbols are the peacock, gold, and the family’s last name ‘Dead’. Morrison  mentions the peacock so many times in the novel that it is hard not to see that it is a symbol . In the novel, the peacock is an allusion to wealth; it looks wealthy, but it is not actually rich because it cannot fly. At one point, Milkman and Guitar see a white peacock and try to catch it, but it gets away from them. The peacock symbolizes the wealth that Milkman is searching for but can never quite catch. Milkman even says, “life, safety,a nd luxury fanned out before him like the tail spread of a peacock (170).” This shows that Milkman thinks that when he gets rich, or symbolically ‘catches the peacock’, his life will be worry-free. Another symbol in Song of Solomon that connects to Milkman’s search to become wealthy is the gold. The whole second half of the novel is Milkman’s hunt to find the gold that he thinks is left in a cave. The search for the gold makes him go to extreme measures; he steals from his aunt, Pilate when he discovers that the gold may be in her house. Milkman wants the gold to become independent and to live on his own without the help of his family. Along with the peacock, the gold symbolizes Milkman’s obsession with becoming wealthy.
Toni Morrison uses names of people and things that have symbolic meaning in her novels. One of the symbolic names in Song of Solomon is the name ‘Dead’. This is the last name of the family the novel centers around. It is symbolic because Milkman’s father wanted him dead before he was even born. The last name of ‘Dead’ also shows the family dynamics and how Milkman, his sisters, and his parents have no real connection to each other, therefore, their family is symbolically dead. Also, it is ironic that this family has the last name of ‘Dead’ when the father, Macon Dead, drives a hearse. In my opinion, Morrison adds little details like the hearse just to see if her readers are able to make connections.
The two symbols that I found in Beloved were the number 124 and ‘Sweet Home’ . 124 is the house address where Sethe settled her family in Ohio after she ran away from the south. It is symbolic that the numbers are 124 because they numbers represent her children. The numbers 1 and 2 represent Sethe’s two oldest children. The number 4 represents her youngest daughter, Denver , who she gave birth to on her way to Ohio. The 3 is missing because Sethe killed her 3rd child, Beloved, who she killed when she found out that people were coming to take her and her family back to the South.
Along with the name ‘Dead’ in Song of Solomon, the name ‘Sweet Home’ also has symbolic meaning in Beloved. Sweet Home was the name of the farm/plantation that Sethe worked at in the South, before she moved to Ohio with her children. It is symbolic because although the name of the farm was ‘Sweet Home’, it was not a sweet home at all. In fact, it was just the opposite. Sethe tells us that the owners of Sweet Home were moderately nice and took good care of the workers, but this was the same place that Sethe was severely beaten, raped, and had the milk taken from her breasts. Since almost 20 years have gone by since Sethe was at Sweet Home, it is nothing but a memory to her. She associates Sweet Home not only with the place where she met her husband, Halle, but it is also the place that caused her so much pain and sorrow.
The main symbol in the novel The Bluest Eye, is in fact, the bluest eye. Pecola, the main character in the novel, is an eleven year old black girl who associates blue eyes with  happiness and being white. She thinks that you need blue eyes in order to be beautiful. Blue eyes symbolize the sadness in Pecola’s life and what she would do just to be in the white middle class. The other symbol in the Bluest Eye is the home in which the Breedloves live in. Since the house they live in is old and falling apart, it symbolizes the pain the individuals in the family are dealing with. It also symbolizes the opposite of what Pecola imagines the perfect family to have. They don’t have houses with big white doors or a white picket fence. The family’s in Pecola’s neighborhood don’t run around laughing and playing. The house that the Breedlove’s live in symbolize the individual struggles Pecola’s family goes through, all within one house.
Although each of these novels had very unique and different symbols, I was able to find some similarities between Morrison’s symbols. The major similarity was her symbolic usage of names and places like ‘Sweet Home’ and the ‘Dead’ family. I think that she uses symbolic names and places to add complexity to her novels and see if her readers are able to find the symbolism and irony in the names. Also, she also puts a lot of emphasis on symbolic places. For example, the characters have so much emotional attachment to places such as the home that the Breedloves live in, in The Bluest Eye and ‘Sweet Home’ in Beloved. Overall, I found that the symbols in all three of Morrison’s novels added a lot to the stories and gave them all a deeper meaning. |
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