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Trauma and Healing in Toni Morrison's the Bluest Eye and Home

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Trauma and Healing in Toni Morrison's the Bluest Eye and Home UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO RIO GRANDE DO SUL INSTITUTO DE LETRAS Rosana Ruas Machado Gomes Trauma and Healing in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and Home Porto Alegre 2019 Rosana Ruas Machado Gomes Trauma and Healing in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and Home Dissertação de mestrado apresentada ao Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul como requisito parcial para obtenção do grau de Mestra em Letras. Orientadora: Profa. Dra. Rita Terezinha Schmidt Porto Alegre 2019 UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO RIO GRANDE DO SUL REITOR Rui Vicente Oppermann VICE-REITORA Jane Tutikian DIRETORA DO INSTITUTO DE FILOSOFIA E CIÊNCIAS HUMANAS Claudia Wasserman VICE-DIRETORA DO INSTITUTO DE FILOSOFIA E CIÊNCIAS HUMANAS Maria Izabel Saraiva Noll DIRETOR DO INSTITUTO DE LETRAS Sérgio de Moura Menuzzi VICE-DIRETORA DO INSTITUTO DE LETRAS Beatriz Cerisara Gil CHEFE DA BIBLIOTECA DE CIÊNCIAS SOCIAIS E HUMANIDADES Vladimir Luciano Pinto Rosana Ruas Machado Gomes Trauma and Healing in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and Home Dissertação de mestrado apresentada ao Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul como requisito parcial para obtenção do grau de Mestra em Letras. Porto Alegre, 29 de agosto de 2019 Resultado: Aprovada com louvor. BANCA EXAMINADORA: Marta Ramos Oliveira Departamento de Línguas Modernas Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) Sandra Sirangelo Maggio Departamento de Línguas Modernas Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) Vera Lucia Lenz Vianna Da Silva Departamento de Letras Estrangeiras Modernas Universidade Federal de Santa Maria (UFSM) ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my family for understanding the importance of my education and supporting it throughout my life. You have made this thesis possible. I would also like to thank my incredible friends and boyfriend for giving me so much encouragement and love along the way. You have kept me strong and healthy. Thank you to my supervisor, Professor Rita Terezinha Schmidt, for the books, the advice, and all of the vast knowledge which you have shared with me, both in our meetings and in the classes you have ministered. Thank you to Professor Marta Ramos Oliveira and Professor Sandra Sirangelo Maggio for accompanying this project and for being very important to my studies since my undergraduate course. To Professor Vera Lúcia Lenz Viana da Silva, thank you for accepting the invitation to be part of this work. I would also like to thank the professors and staff of the Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras (PPGLet): your guidance and classes were extremely beneficial to my studies. Finally, thank you to Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), for the fellowship that made it possible for me to dedicate myself to my graduate course. RESUMO O olho mais azul, publicado em 1970, traz a história de Pecola Breedlove, uma garota que passa por diferentes abusos e discriminações em função da cor de sua pele. Diante de tanto sofrimento, a menina acaba por perder sua sanidade. Voltar para casa, publicado em 2012, traz a história de Frank Money, um veterano de guerra que embarca em uma viagem de retorno à cidade onde cresceu para resgatar sua irmã, que está em perigo. Durante a jornada, Frank passa a se confrontar com fantasmas do passado que o assombram ainda no presente. De volta a Lotus, os dois irmãos progressivamente se conectam com a comunidade, encontrando algumas respostas que podem ajudá-los a lidar com experiências passadas enquanto forjam um novo futuro. Em ambas as obras, Toni Morrison apresenta situações traumáticas que impactam profundamente as suas personagens. No entanto, uma ―cura‖ para o trauma parece ser possível para somente algumas delas. Diante disso, analiso as representações de trauma e de cura nos dois livros, estabelecendo relações e comparações que podem ajudar a entender por que algumas dessas personagens conseguem chegar saudáveis ao fim das narrativas, enquanto outras não. Como suporte teórico, utilizo principalmente teóricos que escrevem sobre algum aspecto de estudos do trauma, tais quais Cathy Caruth, Bessel van der Kolk e Onno van der Hart, Stef Craps, Irene Visser, Susan Brison e Joy Degruy. Palavras-chave: Toni Morrison; literatura afro-americana; trauma. ABSTRACT The Bluest Eye, published in 1970, tells the story of Pecola Breedlove, a black little girl who undergoes different forms of abuse and discrimination because of the color of her skin. As result of all the suffering and pain which she experiences, the girl ends up losing her sanity. Home, published in 2012, brings us the story of Frank Money, a war veteran who embarks on a journey back to his hometown in order to rescue his sister, who is in danger. Along the way, Fran starts facing the ghosts from his past, who still haunt him in the present. Back in Lotus, the two siblings progressively reconnect to their community, finding some answers that may help them cope with past experiences while creating a new future. In both novels, Toni Morrison presents traumatic situations that leave her characters deeply impacted. However, healing seems possible for only some of them. Thus, I analyze the representations of trauma and healing in the two books, establishing relationships and comparisons which may help us understand the reasons why some of these characters are able to heal and become healthy by the end of the narratives, while others are not. As theoretical background, I mostly consult scholars who write about some aspect of trauma studies, such as Cathy Caruth, Bessel van der Kolk and Onno van der Hart, Stef Craps, Irene Visser, Susan Brison and Joy Degruy. Keywords: Toni Morrison; African American literature; trauma. ABBREVIATIONS T Cathy Caruth, Trauma: Explorations in Memory (The Johns Hopkins university Press, 1995). UE Cathy Caruth, Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, and History (The Johns Hopkins university Press, 1996). PTSS Joy Degruy, Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome: America‘s Legacy of Enduring Injury and Healing (Uptone Press, 2005). PW Stef Craps, Postcolonial Witnessing: Trauma Out of Bounds (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). TBE Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye (Vintage Book, 1999). APOIO DE FINANCIAMENTO CAPES This study was financed in part by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior – Brasil (CAPES) – Código de Financiamento 001. TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction ........................................................................................................................................... 7 1 Theoretical Speculations on Trauma, Literature, and the Decolonization of Trauma Theory 11 2 The Bluest Eye .................................................................................................................................. 26 2.1 Quiet as it‘s Kept: Civil Rights Movement, the Black Art Movement and the Lack of Space for Black Women .................................................................................................................................... 27 2.2 Here is the House: Structure and Voices ..................................................................................... 34 2.2 Here is the Family: Pauline and Cholly Breedlove ..................................................................... 42 2.3: See Jane: Pecola Breedlove, the silenced voice ......................................................................... 56 2.4: The friend will play with Jane: Claudia MacTeer and the promoting of healing through the revisiting of the past and the seeding of nurturing values ................................................................. 63 3 Home .................................................................................................................................................. 72 3.1 Here Stands A Man: Frank Money‘s Journey to Recovery ......................................................... 75 3.2 Come on, Brother. Let‘s Go Home: Community and Healing .................................................... 95 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................................... 108 Works Cited ......................................................................................................................................... 115 7 Introduction In the introduction to The Cambridge Companion to Toni Morrison (2007), Justine Tally comments on how Toni Morrison—who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993—is one of the most widely studied contemporary American writers (2). Her works—in particular Beloved (1987)—have been extensively discussed by scholars all over the world. Many anthologies on her oeuvre have been published, including the aforementioned The Cambridge Companion to Toni Morrison and others, such as Critical Companion to Toni Morrison: A Literary Reference to Her Life and Work (2008), Toni Morrison: A Literary Life (2015), and Contested Boundaries: New Critical Essays on the Fiction of Toni Morrison (2013). Regarding The Bluest Eye (1970), one of the most important anthologies published is Bloom‘s Modern Critical Interpretations: Toni Morrison‘s The Bluest Eye (2007), in which different scholars, such as Deborah T. Werrlein, discuss aspects such as text and countertext, and notions of childhood and nation in the novel. Especially relevant to my studies are Carl D. Malmgren‘s and Cat Moses‘s works. In Malmgren‘s ―Text, Voices and Primers in Toni Morrison‘s The Bluest Eye‖, the scholar analyzes the different
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