Morrison’s ideas to Everett’s Erasure

23 9 CHL 4] ¢ HARACTER

whileandeonstellations wheeled on. It would be dawn and then sun-y aly

ald, nid all ou c . hungry. But that would be to-morrow and nowhe Was a

get up and come won d cure that. His breathing was easier nowand he decided

whéiallmvost las ". and then he found that he had been asleep because he kney to

They wens os ns i “a night almost over. He couldtell that from the whippoorwith

tioned an cet ners now among the dark trees below him, constant and infl * Weaeren cease ae so that, as theinstant for giving over to

the daybirds a

little stiff -_ ate ere was no intervalatall between them. He got up. He W

outs les Fi wa ing would cure that too as it would the cold, and so

shes liquid sil “ Be te went ondow nthehill, toward the dark woodswith

: voices of the birds called unceasing—therapid and urgen

Was g on there

1 which

f > e ee . >

t bear of the urgent and quiring heart of thelate spring night. He did not look back8

1939

QUESTIONS

lL. ioeporn in Barn BURNING, Sarty thinks that “maybe” his father “couldn't h, i] 4 be whatheis (par. 40). What is Abner Snopes? Whatdesires, motives, yal ep

and views—especially of justice—seemto drive and explain him? What d se story imply about how and whyhe has become the man he is? What might beait!

rable, as well as abhorrent, about him? How does the narrative point of view Gen

your understandingof, and attitude toward, Abner? wae

. Howis Sarty characterized? Howis this characterization affected by the multi flashforwardsin the story and bythe waySarty’s thoughts are presented? Does gon

change over the course of the story? Howand why does he change or not chan e . What do each of the minor characters contribute to the story, especially Si o mother, sisters, and older brother? . =

TONI MORRISON

(b. 1931) Recitatif'

Born in Lorain, Ohio, a steel town on the shores of

Lake Erie, Chloe Anthony Wofford was the first

memberof her family to attend college, graduating

from Howard University in 1953 and earning an MA

from Cornell. She taught at both Texas Southern Uni-

versity and at Howard before becoming an editor at

Random House, where she worked for nearly twenty years. In such novels as TheBluest

Eve (1969), Sula (1973), Song of Solomon (19 77), 3eloved (1987), Paradise (1998), A

Mercy (2008), and Home (2012), Morrison t races the problems and possibilities faced

by black Americans struggling with slavery and its aftermath in the United States.

Morrisonis also a gifted and influential critic and essayist: Her oft-cited Playi

ng the

Dark. Whuteness and the Literary Imagination appeared in 1993, the sameyeat she

becamethefirst African American author to win the Nobel Prizefor Literature.

1. In classical music such as opera, a vocal passa gethat is sung in a speechlike manner.

FONT MORRISON RBecitatit 231

y mother danced all night and Roberta's was sick. That's why we were

taken to St. Bonny s. People want to put their ar ms around you when you

hem you were ina shelter, but it really wasn't bad. No big long roomwith

; hundred beds like Bellevue.* I herew ere four toa room, and when Roberta

one me ame, there was a shortage of state kids, so we were the only ones

antigned to 406 and could go roms bedto bed if we

wanted to. And we wanted

too. We changed beds every night and for the whole four months we were

ye never picked one out as our own permanent bed.

jt didn't start out that way. The minute I walked in and the Big Bozointro-

dus, | got sick to my stomach. It was on e thing to be taken out of your own

pad early in the morning—it was somethingelse to be stuck in a str ange place

with a girl from a W hole other race. An d Mary, that’s my mother, she was ri

ght.

Every now and then she would stop dancing long enough totell me som ething

important and one of the things she said was that they never washed their hair

and they smelled funny. Robertasure did. Smell funny, | mean. So when theBig

Bozo (nobody ever called her Mrs. It kin, just like nobody ever said St.

Bonaventure)—when she said, “Twyla, this is Roberta. Roberta,

this is Iwyla.

Make each other welcome.” I said, “My mo ther won't like you putting mein here.”

“Good,” said Bozo. “Maybe then she'll comeand ta ke you home.”

How's that for mean? If Roberta had laughed | wou ld havekilled her, but she

didn't. She just walkedover to the window and stood with her back to us.

“Furn around,” said the Bozo. “Don't be rude. Now ‘ Twyla. Roberta. When

you heara loud buzzer, that's the call for dinner. Come downto the first floor.

Anyfights and no mov ie.” And then, just to make sure we knew what we would

tell

to. there ¥

duce

be missing, “The Wiz rd of Oz.”

Roberta must have thought | meant that my mo ther would be mad about my

being put in the shelter. Not about roomin g with her, because as soon as Bozo

left she came over to me andsaid, “Is y our mothersick too?”

“No,” L said. “Shejust likes to danceall night.”

“Oh.” she noddedher head andI liked the way she unde rstood things so fast.

So for the momentit didn’t matter that we look ed like salt and pepper standing

there and that’s what theother kids called us some times. Wewere eight years

old and got F's all the time. Me because I cou ldn't remember what | read or

what the teacher said. And Roberta becaus e she couldn't read at all and didn't

evenlisten to the teacher. She wasn't good at an ything except jacks, at which

she Was a killer: pow scoo p pow scoop pow scoop.

We didn't like each otherall that much at fi rst, but nobody else wanted to

play with us because we weren't real orphans wit h beautiful deadparentsin the

sky. We were dumped. Even the New Yor k City Puerto Ricans and the upstate

Indians ignored us. All kinds of kids werein there, bl ack ones, white ones, even

two Koreans. The food was good, though. At least | tho ught so. Roberta hated it

and left whole pieces of things on herplat e: Spam, Salisbury steak—even jello

with fruit cocktail in it, and she didn't careif [ate wh at she wouldn't. Mary's

idea of supper was popcorn and a ca n of Yoo-Hoo. Hot mashedpotatoes an

d

two weenies was like Thanksgiving for me.

2. Large New York C ity hospital best k nown for its psychiatric wards

w

232° CH. 4) CHARACTER

10 acabad, St. Bonny’s. The big girls on the second floor Pusheg

wobbled theink then. But that wasall. T hey wore lipstick and eyebrow SASHTheareas ees while they watched TV. Fifteen, sixteen, even, some

fought their cnet girls, scared runaways most of them. Poor little girls wh

mean. The tatty reel but looked tough to us, and mean. God did they lo 0

tithes they : at ie to keep them separate fromthe younger children, buy aie danced ee = us watchingthem in the orchard where they played radios ai emis: ‘Wee eachother. 1 hey’d light out after us and pull our hair OF twist on

other one —_ neato sot them, Robertaand me, but neither of us Wanted ih

Wher we tan ae it. So we got a goodlist of dirty names wecould shout bact alware the athem through the orchard. I used to dream a lot

Hundveds oe ar was there. Two acres, four maybe, of these little apple trees

St. Bonab t em Empty and crooked like beggar womenwhen| first came to

orchand ue at with flowers whenI left. | don't know why I dreamtabout th; so much. Nothing really happened there. Nothing all that importan a

mean. Just the big girls dancing and playing theradio. Roberta and me vtchig Maggie fell downthere once. The kitchen womanwithlegs like parentheses i, ; the big girls laughed at her. We should have helped her up, 1 know, but we\ aid scared of those girls with lipstick and eyebrowpencil. Maggie couldn't talk Th kids said she had her tonguecutout, but I think she was just born that way: mu . She was old and sandy-colored and she workedin the kitchen. I don't knowif vt wasnice or not. I just rememberherlegs like parentheses and how she riche whenshe walked. She worked fromearly in the morningtill two o'clock, and if she waslate, if she had too muchcleaning and didn't get outtill two-fifteen or ‘o she'd cut through the orchard so she wouldn't miss her bus and have to seal another hour. She worethis really stupid little hat—a kid's hat with ear flaps— and she wasn't muchtaller than we were. A really awful little hat. Even for a mute, it was dumb—dressinglike a kid and never saying anythingatall.

“But what about if somebodytries to kill her?” | used to wonderaboutthat “Or whatif she wants to cry? Can she cry?” ,

“Sure,” Roberta said. “But just tears. No sounds comeout.”

“She can't scream?” “Nope. Nothing.”

1s “Can she hear?”

“T guess.” “Let's call her,” [ said. And wedid. “Dummy! Dummy!” She never turned herhead. “Bowlegs! Bowlegs!” Nothing. She just rocked on, the chin straps of her baby-

boy hat swaying from side toside. | think we were wrong.I think she could hear

and didnt let on. And it shames me even nowto think there was somebodyin

there after all who heard us call her those names and couldn'ttell on us.

20 Wegotalongall right, Roberta and me. Changed bedsevery night, got F'sin

civics and communication skills and gym. The Bozo was disappointed in us.

she said. Out of 130of us state cases, 90 were under twelve. Almostall were

real orphans with beautiful dead parents in the sky. We were the only ones

dumped and the only ones with F'sin three classes including gym. So we got

along—whatwithherleaving wholepiecesof things on her plate and beingnice

about not asking questions.

of then,

and almos,

ancy US Pencil g

TONI MORRISON Recitatif 233

thinkit was the daybefore Ma ggie fell down that we found o

ut our mothers

voming to visit us on the sameSunday. We had been at the shelter twenty-

y ‘days (Roberta twenty-eight and a half) and this wastheirfirst visit wit

h us.

ot hers would come at ten oclock in timefor chapel , then lunch with us

teachers. lounge. | thought if my danc ing mother met her sick motherit

be good for her. And Roberta thought her sick mother wouldget a big bang

fa dancing one. Wegot excited aboutit and curled each other's hair. After

‘ rast we sat on the bed watching the ro ad from the window. Roberta's socks

; still wet. She washed them thenight before and put them on the radiato r

were * They hadn't, but she put them on anyway becau se their tops were so

,_-scalloped in pink. Each of us had a purple constru ction-paper basket

ve had madein craft class. Mine had a yellowcrayon rabbit onit. Roberta 's

ra gs with wiggly lines of color. Inside were cellop hane grass and just the

hat ears because I'd eaten the two m arshmalloweggs they gave us. The Bi

g

jelly came herself to get us. Smiling she told us we looked very nice and to

pore downstairs. We were so surp rised by the smile we'd never seen be

fore,

neither of us moved, os. Ahh

“Don't you want to see your mommies?

| stoodup first andspilled thejelly beansall over the floor. Bozo’s smile dis-

appeared while we scrambledto get the candyupofft he floor and putit back

in the grass- . /

She escorted us downstairs to thefirst floor, wher e the othergirls were lining

up to file into the chapel. A bunch of grown-u ps stood to one side. Viewers

mostly. The old biddies who wantedservants and t he fags who wanted company

looking for children they might wantto adop t. Once in a while a grandmother.

Almost never anybody young or anybody whose f ace wouldn't scare you in the

night. Because if any of the real orphans had youngrel atives they wouldn't be

real orphans. I saw Mary right away. She had on those green slacks| hated and

hated even more nowbecause didn't she know we were going to chapel? And

that fur jacket with the pocketlinings so ripped she hadt o pull to get her hands

out of them. But her face was pretty—l ike always, and she smiled and wavedlike

she was thelittle girl looking for her mo ther—not me.

I walked slowly, trying not to drop the jelly beans and ho ping the paper

handle would hold. I had to use mylast Chiclet because by t he time I finished

cutting everything out, all the Elmer's was gone. Lam left-h anded and the scissors

never worked for me.It didn't matter, though; | might just as w ell have chewed

the gum. Marydroppedto her knees and grabbed me, mas hing the basket, the

jelly beans, and the grass into herratty fur jacket.

“Twyla, baby. Twyla, baby!”

{ could havekilled her. Already | heard thebig girls in the or chard the next

time saying, “Twyyyyyla, baby!” But| couldn't stay mad a t Mary while she was

smiling and hugging me and smelling of Lady Esther dusting powder . | wanted

to stay buried in her fur all day. Totell the truth I forgot about Roberta. Mary and

J

got in line for the traipse

into chapel and I wasfeeling proud because she looked so beau tiful even in

those ugly green slacks that made her behind stick out. A pret ty mother on

earth is better than a beautiful dead onein the sky evenif she did leave youal l

aloneto go dancing.

)234 CHL 4) CHARACTER

Tfelt ataPon my shoulder, turned, and saw Roberta smiling. | smj but not too S mile dappened eae jestsomebody think eee it was the biggest thing t Mate, Twila \ i i Ne " Roberta sale _ other, want you to mee

| looked u ; ue thats lwyla’s mother. / :

Shaso mac ti ! a seemedfor miles. Shewasbig. Biggerthan any man

Aged the s Iggest cross | d ever seen. I sw car it was six inches lon crook of her arm was the biggest Bible ever made.

Mary, simple-mindedas ever, grinnedandtried to yank her hand out aea the raggedy lining—to shake hands, | guess. Robert (00 vn at me and then looked downat Mary too. She didn't say anyth; Just grabbed Roberta with her Bible-free hand and stepped out ofline We ii . quickly to therear ofit. Mary was still grinning becauseshe's not too swifty me it Comes to what's really going on. Then this light bulb goes off in her head; nt she says “That bitch!” really loud and us almost in the chapel now, Orpanx nd Whining: the Bonny Angels singing sweetly. Everybody in the world ture aroundto look. And Mary would havekept it up—kept calling namesif| hat squeezedher handas hard as | could. That helpedalittle, but she still (Silchar and crossed and uncrossedherlegs all through service. Even groaned acoy i ol times. Whydid I think she would come there and act right? Slacks. No he like the grandmothers and viewers, and groaning all the while. When we stood for hymns she kept her mouth shut. Wouldn't even look at the words on the page. She actually reached in her purse for a mirror to check her lipstick. All] couldthink of was that she really neededto bekilled. The sermonlasted a ye andI knewthereal orphans were looking smug again. . We were supposed to have lunch in the teachers’ lounge, but Marydidnt

bring anything, so wepicked fur and cellophanegrass off the mashedjelly beans andate them. | could havekilled her. | sneaked a look at Roberta. Her mother had brought chicken legs and ham sandwiches and oranges and a whole box of chocolate-covered grahams. Roberta drank milk from a thermos while her

mother read the Bible to her. Things are not right. The wrong food is always with the wrong people. Maybe

that’s why[ got into waitress work later—to match uptheright people with the right food. Roberta just let those chickenlegssit there, but she did bring a stack of grahamsup to me later whenthe visit was over. I think she was sorrythat her mother would not shake my mother's hand. And liked that and | liked thefact

that she didn't sav a word about Mary groaning all the way through theservice

andnot bringing anylunch.

Roberta left in May whentheapple trees were heavy and white. Onherlast

dav we went to the orchard to watchthe big girls smoke and dance by the radio.

it didn’t matter that they said, “Iwyyyyyla, baby.” We sat on the ground and

breathed. Lady Esther. Apple blossoms.| still go soft when I smell one or the

other. Roberta was going home. Thebig cross and the big Bible was coming

get her and she seemedsort of glad and sort ofnot. | thought I would diein that

roomoffour beds without her and I knew Bozohad plans to move some other

dumpedkid in there with me. Roberta promised to write every day, which was

really sweet of her because she couldn't read a lick so how could she write any

body. | would have drawnpictures and sent them to her but she never gave ™

her address. Little by little she faded. Her wet socks with the pink scalloped

d back

hat CVe. t my room

and on hey

Beach way

: of the as Mother;

ar,

TONI MORRISON Recitatif 235

nd her big serious-looking eyes—that's all | could catch whenI tried to

phertomind,

| was working behind the counter at the Howard Johnson's on the Thruway

~ ot before the Kingston exit. Not a bad job. Kind of a long ride from New-

jus hy,’ but okay once I got there. Mine was the second night shift——clevento

pul “Very light until a Greyhound checked in for breakfast around six-thirty.

ae hour the sun wasall the wayclear of the hills behind the restaurant.

ALS vlc looked better at night—more like shelter—but | loved it when the

Ther’ ke in, even if it did showall the cracks in the vinyl and the speckled

Jooked dirty no matter what the mop boydid. ,

te was August anda bus crowdwasjust unloading. They would stand around

along while: going to the john,and looking at gifts and junk-for-sale machines,

Juctanttosil down sosoon. Even to eat. I was trying tofill the coffee pots and

we themall situated onthe electric burners when | saw her. She wassitting in a

Booth smoking a cigarette with two guys smothered in head andfacial hair. Her

own hair was $0 big and wild | could hardly see her face. But the eyes. | would

know them anywhere. She had ona powder-blue halter and shorts outfit and ear-

rings the size of bracelets. Talk about lipstick and eyebrowpencil. She made the

big gitls look like nuns. | couldn't get off the counter until seven oclock, but I

kept watching the booth in case they got up to leave before that. My replacement

was on time for a change,so | counted and stacked myreceipts as fast as | could

and signed off. | walked over to the booth, smiling and wondering if she would

remember me. Or even if she wanted to remember me. Maybe she didn’t want to

be reminded ofSt. Bonny’s or to have anybody knowshe waseverthere. | know

| never talked aboutit to anybody.

| put my hands in my apron pockets and leanedagainst the back of the booth

facing them.

“Roberta? Roberta Fisk?”

She looked up. “Yeah?”

“Twyla.” 40

She squinted for a second and then said, “Wow.”

“Remember me?” “Sure. Hey. Wow.” “It's been a while,” I said, and gave a smile to the twohairy guys.

“Yeah. Wow. You work here?” 45

“Yeah,” I said. “I live in Newburgh.”

“Newburgh? Nokidding?” She laughed then a private laugh that included the

guys but only the guys, and they laughed with her. What could | do but laugh too

and wonder why | was standing there with my knees showing out from underthat

uniform. Without looking | could see the blue and white triangle on my head, my

hair shapeless in a net, my ankles thick in white oxfords. Nothing could have been

less sheer than mystockings. There was this silence that came downrightafter |

laughed. A silence it was her turntofill up. With introductions, maybe,to her

boyfriends or an invitation to sit down and have a Coke. Insteadshelit a cigarette

off the one she'd just finishedandsaid, “We're on our wayto the Coast. He's got an

appointment with Hendrix.” She gestured casually toward the boynext to her.

a top>

pring w a

3. City on the Hudson River north of New York City.

SO

55

: ‘236° CHL 4 | CHARACTER

Hendrix? Fantastic,” | said. “Really fantastic. What's she doing now>" Roberta coughedon her cigarette and the two guys rolled their eyes yy.

ceiling, , Pat the

Hendrix, Jimi Hendrix, asshole. He's only the biggest—Oh, wow. Koy, Let as be ’ Was dismissed without anyonesaying goodbye,so| thought | would i i Me

“Tr, Or

How's your mother?” | asked. Her grin cracked her whole face. Shes owed, Fine,” she said. “How's yours?” “wal.

Pretty as a picture,” | said and turned away. The backs of my knees w damp. Howard Johnson's really was a dumpinthesunlight. vere

James is as comfortable as a houseslipper. He liked my cooking and | like his big loud family. They havelived in Newburgh all of their lives and at about it the way people do whohave always known a home. His grandmoth k 's a porch swing older thanhis father and when they talk aboutstreets and avenues and buildings they call them names they nolonger have. They still call the A & P* Rico's becauseit stands on property once a mom andpopstore owned by Mr. Rico. And theycall the new community college ‘Town Hall becauseit once was. Mymother-in-law puts upjelly and cucumbers and buys butter wrapped in cloth from a dairy. James and his father talk aboutfishin andbaseball and I can see themall together on the Hudsonin a raggedy skiff Half the population of Newburghis on welfare now, but to my husband's fam. ily it was still some upstate paradiseofa timelong past. A timeofice houses and vegetable wagons, coal furnaces and children weeding gardens. When our son was born my mother-in-law gave me the crib blanket that had been hers.

But the town they remembered had changed. Something quick wasin the air. Magnificent old houses, so ruined they had become shelter for squatters and rent risks, were bought and renovated. Smart IBM? people moved out of their suburbs back into the city and put shutters up and herb gardensin their backyards. A brochure came in the mail announcing the opening of a Food Emporium. Gourmetfood it said—andlisted items the rich IBM crowd would want. It was located in a newmall at the edge of town and I drove out to shop there one day—justto see. It was late in June. After the tulips were gone and

the Queen Elizabeth roses were open everywhere. | trailed my cart along the aisle tossing in smoked oysters and Robert's sauce and things | knew wouldsit in mycupboard for years. Only when I found some Klondike ice cream bars did I feel less guilty about spending James's fireman's salary sofoolishly. My father- in-lawate them with the same gustolittle Joseph did.

Waiting in the check-outline I heard a voice say, “Twyla!” The classical music piped over the aisles had affected me and the woman

leaning toward mewasdressed to kill. Diamonds on her hand, a smart hite

summerdress. “I'm Mrs. Benson,”I said. “Ho. Ho. The Big Bozo,” she sang.

4. Supermarket, part of a chain originally known as th e Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company.

5. The International Business Machine Corporation, whichhad its executive headquarters in Pough-

keepsie, New York.

ol aS

TONE MORRISON Recitatif 237 %

econdJ didn't knowwhatshewas talking about. She had a bunc h

., split s De fora a and twocartonsof fancy water.

paraee™., 60 “Roberta:

“pight. -

_ of Wek great,” she said. . _

en you. Where are you? Here? In Newburgh?’

“90 ‘ ‘Owe in Annandale.”

x is opening My mouth to say more whenthe cashier called my attention to

a y counter. / ;

wvfeetyou outside.” Roberta pointed herfinger and wentinto the expressline.

es .d the groceries and kept myself from glancing aroundto check Rober-

| place mi | remembered Howard Johnson's and looking for a chanceto speak

tas ai greeted with astingy “wow.” But she was waiting for me and her huge

ee leek now, smooth around a small, nicely shaped head. Shoes, dress,

and summeryand rich. | was dying to know what happenedto

n’s sake. Roberta.”

65

her empt

only hair as $

thing, lovely \

oerate got from Jimi Hendrix to Annandale , a neighborhoodfull of doc-

ner, s nd IBM executives. Easy, | thought. Ev

erything is so easy for them. They

ors 4

think they own the world .

-

“How long,” | asked her. “Howlong have you been here?

“\ year. | got married to a man wholives here. And you, y oure married too, 70

right?Benson, you said.”

“Yeah. James Benson.

“And is he nice?

“Oh, is he nice?

“Well, is he?” Roberta's eyes were steady as th ough she really meant the

estion and wanted an answer .

" “He's wonderful, Roberta. Wonderful.” 75

“So you're happy.”

“Very.” “That's good,” she said and noddedher head. “I always ho

ped you'd be happy.

Anykids? | knowyou havekids.”

“One. A boy. Howabout you?”

“Four.” 80

“Four?”

She laughed. “Step kids. He's a widower.”

“Oh?”

“Got a minute? Let's have a coffee.” —

I thought about the Klondikes melting and the inconve nienceof going all the 8s

way to my car and putting the bags in the trunk. Ser ved meright for buyingall

that stuff 1 didn't need. Roberta was ahead of me.

“Put them in mycar. It's right here.” And then I saw the dark blue limousine.

“You married a Chinaman?” “No,” she laughed. “He's the driver.”

“Oh, my. If the Big Bozo could see you now.” We both giggled. Really giggled. Suddenly,in just a pulse beat, twe

nty years

disappeared andall of it came rushing back. The big girls (whom we calle d gar

90

9S

100

10S

110

11s

120

d2¢ . 238 CH. 4 | CHARACTER

girls— Roberta's misheard word for the evil stone faces described jn ; class) there dancing in the orchard, the ploppy mashed potatoes, th ‘ Weenies, the Spamwith pineapple We ent itd the <offeeshon h t e double Oheanother. Pam with pineapple. We wentinto

the

coffee shop holding on another andI tried to think whywewere glad to see each otherthis tin,”

not before. Once, twelve years ago, we passed like strangers. A black Ime and Whitegirl meeting i sa rene “road and havi girl and g One 2 ul ing ina Howard Johnson's on the road and having nothingto Say

He in a blue and white triangle waitress hat—theother on her wayto see H ay, drix. Now we werebehavinglike sisters separated for much too long, Those ih short months were nothing in time. Maybeit was the thingitself, Just ben there, together. Twolittle girls who knew what nobodyelse in the world knew? how not to ask questions. Howto believe what had to be believed. There Woe politeness in that reluctance and generosityas well. Is your mothersick too? Ne she dancesall night. Oh—andan understanding nod. e, We sat in a boothby the windowandfell into recollection like veterans ‘Did you ever learn to read?”

; “Watch.” She picked up the menu. “Special of the day. Cream of corn soy Entrées. Two dots and a wrigglyline. Quiche. Chefsalad, scallops . . .”

I was laughing and applauding when the waitress cameup.

“Rememberthe Easter baskets?” “Andhowwe tried to introduce them?” “Your mother with that cross like two telephone poles.” “And yours with those tight slacks.” Welaughed so loudly heads turned and madethe laughter harder to suppress.

“What happenedto the Jimi Hendrix date?” Roberta made a blow-out sound withherlips. “When hedied I thought about you.” “Oh, you heard about him finally?” “Finally. Come on, | was a small-town country waitress.” “AndI was a small-town country dropout. God, were wewild.| still don’t know

howI got out ofthere alive.” “But you did.” “1 did. I really did. Now 'm Mrs. Kenneth Norton.” “Soundslike a mouthful.” “It is.” “Servants and all?” Robertaheld uptwofingers. “Ow! Whatdoes he do?” “Computers and stuff. What do | know?”

“| don't rememberahell of a lot from those days, but Lord, St. Bonny’s is &

clear as daylight. Remember Maggie? The dayshe fell down and those gar girls

laughedat her?” Roberta looked up fromher salad and stared at me. “Maggie didn't fall,” she

said. “Yes, she did. You remember.”

“No, Twyla. They knocked her down. Those girls pushed her down andtore

her clothes. In the orchard.”

“1 don't—that's not what happened.”

“Sure it is. In the orchard. Remember how scared we were?”

“Wait a minute. I don't rememberanyof that.”

CiVicg

TONI MORRISON Recitatif 239

“And Bozo was fired.”

“Youre cTaZzy- She was there when I left. You left before me.” ~y went back. You weren't there when theyfired Bozo.”

“What?” ; “Fwice. Once for aryean Ww hen I was about ten, another for two months when

[was fourteen. That's when I ran away.

“You ran away from St. Bonny’s?

“[ had to. Whatdo you want?Me dancing in that orcha rd?”

“Are you sure about Maggie?

“Of course I'msure. You ve blockedit, Twyla. It happened. Thosegirls had 1 30

behavior problems, y ou know.

“pidnt they, though. But whycan't I remember the Maggie thing?” “Believe me.It happened. And wewerethere.” “Who did you room with when you went back?” I asked her as if | would

knowher. The Maggie thing wastroubling me.

“Creeps. They tickled themselvesin the night.”

Myears were itching and I wanted to go home suddenly. This was all very 135

well but she couldn't just comb herhair, wash her face and preten d everything

was hunky-dory. After the Howard Johnson's snub. And noapology. Nothing,

“Were you on dope or what that time at HowardJohnson's?” I tried to make

my voice soundfriendlier than | felt.

““Maybe, a little. I never did drugs much. Why?”

“t don't know; you acted sortof like you didn't want to know me then.”

“Oh, Twyla, you knowhowit was in those days: black—white. You know how

everything was.”

But I didn’t know. I thoughtit was just the opposite. Busloadsofblacks and_ iso

whites came into Howard Johnson's together. They roamed togetherthen: stu-

dents, musicians, lovers, protesters. You got to see everything at Howard John-

son's and blacks were very friendly with whites in those days. But sitting there

with nothing on my plate but two hard tomato wedges wondering about the

melting Klondikes it seemed childish remembering the slight. We went to her

car, and with the helpof the driver, got mystuff into mystation wagon.

“We'll keep in touch this time,” she said.

“Sure,” I said. “Sure. Give me a call.” “I will,” she said, and then just as | wassliding behind the wheel, she leaned

into the window. “Bythe way. Your mother. Did she ever stop dancing?”

1 shook my head. “No. Never.”

Roberta nodded. “And yours? Did she ever get well?” She smiled a tiny sad smile. “No. She never did. Look, call me, okay?”

“Okay,” I said, but I knew | wouldn't. Roberta had messedup mypast so mehow

With that business about Maggie. I wouldntforget a thing like that. Would I?

125

Strife cameto usthat fall. At least that’s what the paper calledit. Strife. Racia l

strife.The word made methinkofa bird—abig shriekingbird out of1, 000,000,000

BC. Flapping its wings and cawing. Its eye with nolid always bearing down on

You. All day it screeched and atnight it slept on the rooftops. It woke you in the Morning and from the Today showtothe eleven oclock news it kept you an awful company. | couldn't figure it out from onedayto the next. | knew IT was

150

160.

165

170

uo tn uman Ve

z ACTE /

ACTER TONS MORRISON Recitatif 241

supposedto feel something strong, but 1 didn't know what, and Jameswai;

any help. Joseph was onthelist of kids to be transferred from the junior he

school to another one at some far-out-of-the-way place and I thoughtit yw, mh

good thing until | heardit was a badthing. | meanI didn't know. All the eal a

seemed dumps to me, andthefact that one was nicer looking didn't hold Tat weight. But the papers werefull ofit and then the kids began toget fionage

August, mind you. Schools weren't even open yet. | thought Joseph might he

frightened to go over there, but he didn't seemscaredso | forgot about it until

I found myself driving along Hudson Street out there bythe school they were try ing to integrate andsawaline of women marching. And whodoyou Suppose

wasinline, big as life, holding asign in front of her bigger than her mothers

Cross? MOTHERS HAVE RIGHTS TOO!it said. :

1 drove on, and then changed my mind. | circled the block, slowed down,and

honked my horn. Roberta looked over and whenshe sawmeshe waved. I didn’t wave back, but

I didn't move either. She handed her sign to another woman and came over to

where | was parked. “Hie” “What are you doing?” “Picketing. What's it look like?” “Whatfor?”

“What do you mean, ‘What for?’ They want to take mykids and send them

out of the neighborhood. They don't wanttogo.”

“So whatif they go to another school? My boy's being bussed too, andI don't

mind. Whyshould you?”

“It's not about us, Twyla. Meand you. It's about our kids.”

“What's more us than that?”

“Well, it is a free country.”

“Not yet, but it will be.”

“What the hell does that mean? I'm not doing anything to you.”

“You really think that?” “I knowit.”

“I wonder what made methink you weredifferent.”

“1 wonder what made methink you were different.”

“Look at them,” I said. “Just look. Whodothey think they are? Swarming all

over theplacelike they ownit. And now they think they can decide where MY

child goes to school. Look at them, Roberta. They're Bozos.”

Roberta turned around andlooked at the women. Almostall of them were

stand-

ing still now, waiting, Somewereevenedging toward us. Roberta looked at meout

of somerefrigerator behind hereyes. “No, they're not. ‘They're just mothers.

“And what am I? Swiss cheese?”

“L used to curl your hair.”

“| hated your hands in my hair.”

‘The womenwere moving. Our faces looked mean to them ofcourse ar

looked as though they could not wait to throw themselves in front

of a police ¢ f

or better yet, into mycar and drag me awayby myankles. Now they surroun’s”

mycar and gently, gently begantorockit. [ swayed

back andforth like a sidewa*

Automatically| reached for Roberta, like the old days in the orchard when

yo-vo. hi

yo-) - fel] the

they saw us watching themandwe had toget out of there, andif one of usfell

and thes at.

[

other pulled her up and : a of us was caught the oth er stayed to kick and

gcratch. and neither wou leave the other behind. My

arm shot out of the car

window but no receiving hand was there. Roberta waslooking

at me sway from

side tO side in the car and herface was still. Mypurseslid from the car seat d

own

under the dashboard. ‘The four policemen who had been drinking Tab in their car

finally got the message and strolled o ver, forcing their way through the wo

men.

Quietly. firmly theyspoke. Okay, ladies. Backin lineor off thest reets.”

Some of them went away willingly; others had to b e urged away from thecar

doors and the hood. Roberta didn't move. She was looking steadily at m

e. | was

fumbling to turn on the ignition, which wouldn't ca tch because thegearshift was

still in drive. The seats of the car were a mess because the swaying ha d thrown

mygrocery coupons all over it and mypurse was sp rawled on thefloor.

“Maybe Lam different now, Twyla. But you're not . Youre the same little state

kid who kicked a poor old black lady when she wa s down on the ground. You

kicked a black lady andyou have thenerve tocall me a bigo t.”

The coupons were everywhere andthe guts of my purse were bunched under

the dashboard. What was she saying? Black? Maggie wasn't black.

“She wasn't black,” I said.

“Like hell she wasn't, and you kicked her. We bot h did. You kicked a black

lady who couldn't even scream.”

“Liar!”

“Yourethe liar! Why don't youjust go on home andleav e us alone, huh?”

She turned awayand [ skidded awayfromthe curb.

The next morning I wentinto the garage and cut th e side out of the carton

our portable TV had comein. It wasntnearly big eno ugh, butafter a while | had

a decent sign: red spray-painted letters on a white b ackground—aNbD sO DO

CHILDREN ****, I meantjust to go down tothe school a ndtack it up somew here

so those cows on the picket line across thestreet could see it, but when I got

there, someten or so others had already assembled—prote sting the cows across

thestreet. Police permits andeverything. I got in line an d we strutted in time

on our side while Roberta's groupstrutted on theirs. That first day we wereal l

dignified, pretending the other side didn't exist. The second day the re was name

calling andfinger gestures. But that was about all. People changed signs fro m

time to time, but Roberta never did and neither did 1. Actual ly my sign didnt

make sense without Roberta's. “And so dochildren what?” one of the women on

myside asked me. Haverights, I said, as thoughi t was obvious.

Roberta didn't acknowledge my presence in any way and | got to thin king

maybe she didn't know I was there. | began to pace my self in the line. jostling

people one minute andlagging behind thenext,so Roberta and | could reach the

end of our respective lines at the same time and there would be a mome ntin our

turn when we would face each other.Still, | couldnt tell whether she saw meand

knew my sign was for her. The next day | went early before we were scheduledto

assemble. I waited until she got there before| exposed mynewcreation. As soon

ao hoisted her MOTHERS HAVE RIGHTS TOO| began to wave myNew on e, which

aid, HOW WoULD you KNOW? | knowshesaw thatone,but I had gotten addicted now, Mysigns got crazier each day, and the women on my side decided that 1 was

a kook. They couldn't make headsortails out of my brilliant screaming posters.

YOUR Tought a painted sign in quee nly red with huge black letters

thatsaid. 1s

MOTHER WELL? Robertatookherlunch break and didn't comebackfor the

XQ a

180

™~,

n

eeeee

24 > CH. 4 | CHARACTER

havebee’ day ‘ anydayafter. ‘Twodays later | stopped going too and couldn:

lissed because nobody understood mysigns anyway. nt

ane‘ pasty six weeks. Classes were suspended and Joseph didn't 8

bored a eee until October. The children— everybody's children—soon jon

locked an" hat extended vacation they thought was going to beso great, The

ookedat TV until their eyes flattened. [ spent a couple of morningstutor ns son, as the other mothers said we should. Twice | openeda text from eee

that he had never turnedin. Twice he yawned in myface. Other mothers ear nizedliving room sessions so the kidswould keep up. None of the kids wh concentrate sotheydrifted back to ThePriceIs Right and The Brady Buy Fe Whentheschoolfinally opened there were fights onceor twice and some sin roared through the streets every once in a while. There werealot of phot as

phers from Albany. Andjust when ABCwas about to send upa newscrew.

‘a

kids settled downlike nothing in the world had happened. Joseph hung my ito WOULD YoU KNOW?sign in his bedroom.| don't know what becameof anp ss DO CHILDREN ****, | think myfather-in-law cleaned somefish onit. He was

always puttering around in our garage. Eachofhis five childrenlived in New.

burgh and heacted as though hehadfive extra homes. I couldn't help looking for Roberta whenJoseph graduated fromhigh school

but I didn't see her. It didn't trouble me much what shehadsaid to mein the Cai

I mean thekicking part. | know I didn't do that, | couldn't do that. But | Was

puzzled byhertelling me Maggie wasblack. When | thought aboutit | actually

couldn't be certain. She wasn't pitch-black, | knew, or | would have remembered

that. What I remember was the kiddie hat, and the semicirclelegs. I tried toreas-

sure myself about the race thing for a long time until it dawned on methat the

truth wasalready there, and Roberta knewit. I didn't kick her; | didn’t join in

with the gar girls and kick that lady, but I sure did wantto. Wewatchedand

never tried to help her and never called for help. Maggie was my dancing

mother. Deaf, | thought, and dumb. Nobody inside. Nobody who would hear

you if you cried in the night. Nobody whocouldtell you anything important

that vou could use. Rocking, dancing, swaying as she walked. And whenthegar

girls pushed her down, and started roughhousing, | knew she wouldn't scream,

couldn't—just like me—andI wasglad about that.

Wedecided notto have a tree, because Christmas w ould be at my mother-in-

so whyhavea tree at both places? Joseph was at s uny New Paltz

economize,we said. But at thelast minute, | cha nged mymind.

that bad. So I rushed around town looking for a tree, some

thing small but wide. Bythetime| found a place, it was snowing and very

late. | dawdled like it was the most important purchase in the world andthe

tree man was fed up with me.Finally | chose one andhadit tied ontothe

car. | drove away slowly because the sand truc ks were not outyet

wntown

law's house, and wehad to

Nothing could be

trunk ofthe

and the streets could be murderat the beginning of a snowfall. Dov

the streets were wide and r ather emptyexcept for a clust

er of people coming

out of the Newburgh Hotel. Th e one hotel in town that wasn't bu

ilt out of

and Plexiglas. A party, proba bly. The men huddled in t

he sno“

cardboard :

and the womenhad onfurs. Shiny things glittered from

were dressed in tails

6. Television sitcom popul arin the 1970s, as was t

he game show The Price Is Right.

=

TONI MORRISON Recitatif 243

neath their coats. It mademetired to look at them. Tired, tired, tire d.

ue next corner was a small diner w

ith loops and loops of paper bells in

ie window. \ s topped the car

and wentin. Jus t for a cup of c

offee and twent y

utes of peace b efore | went home

and tried to finish everything, before

Christmas Eve.

~Twylae

‘There she was. Ina silvery ev ening gown and dark fur coat

.A man andanother

in were with her, the man fumbling for chan ge to put in the cigarette

achine- ‘The woman was humming an d tapping on the counter with her fing

er-

ms ‘Theyall lookeda little bit drunk.

mewell. It’s you. “How are you?”

I shrugged. “Pretty good. Frazzled. Christmas andall. ”

“Regular?” called the womanfromt he counter.

“Fine,” Roberta called back and then, “Wait for mein the c ar.”

Sheslipped into the booth beside me. “I h ave to tell you something, Twyla. |

made u if | ever sawyou again, I'd tell you.”

“fd just as soon not hear anything, Roberta. It d oesn't matter now, any way.”

“No.” shesaid. “Not about that. ”

“Don't belong.” said the woman. Shecarrie d two regulars to go and the man

peeled his cigarette pack as theyleft.

“It's about St. Bonny’s and Mag gie.”

“Oh, please.”

“Listen to me.[ really did think she wasb lack. I didn’t ma

thought so. But now 1 cant be sure. | ju st remember her as old, so old. And

because she couldn't talk—well, you know, I t hought she was crazy. She'd been

brought up in aninstitution like my moth er was andlike

too. And you were right. Wedidn't kick her .It w

il, [wanted to. I really wanted them to hurt h er. [ said we did it, too. You anc

womé

p my mind

we

190

195

{ thought | would be

as the gar girls. Only them. But, |

me, but that’s not true. And | don't want youtocarry that around. It was just

that | wanted to doit so bad that day—wantingtoi s doingit.”

Her eyes were watery from the drinks she'd had, | guess. 1 knowit’s that way

with me. One glass of wine andI start bawling over the lit tlest thing.

“We were kids, Roberta.”

“Yeah. Yeah. | know,just kids.” “Eight.”

“Eight.” “Andlonely.”

“Scared, too.” She wiped her cheeks with the heel of her hand and

smiled. “Well, that'sall

| wanted tosay.” I nodded and couldn't think of any waytofill thesilence that went fromt

diner past the paper bells on out into the snow. It was heavy now. | thought

better wait for the sand trucks beforestarting home.

“Thanks, Roberta.” “Sure.” "Did I tell you? My mother, she never did stop dancing.”

Yes. You told me. And mine, she never got we from the tabletop and covered her face with her palm

he Vd

IL” Robertalifted her hands

s. When she took them

ke that up. I really 200

210

2 >44° CH. 4 | CHARACTER

awayshereally was crying. “ st Teogla Ch: «nk nshag crying. “Oh shit, Twyla. Shit, shit, shit. What the hell hap.

1983

QUESTIONS

1. At th EC ‘ :waRecrratir, how do Twyla’s and Roberta's explorationsof the “truth” ey had seen at St. Bonny’s manyyearsearlier affect your sense of the feu

of later episod si Pa i Tis les in the ¢ a @ i le- story. Is either wyla or Roberta more reliabl than the

2. At whatpointin the story do you first begin to make assumptionsabouttherac class of the two main characters, Twyla and Roberta? Why? Doyou chan “ aad

mindlater in the story? When and why so—ornot? Whatis the significance of oa rison’s choice both to withhold information about the characters’ race and cla a to have Twyla narrate the story? ene

3. How doesthe relationship between Twyla and Roberta evolve over the courseofth story? .

AUTHORS ON THEIR WORK

TONI MORRISON(b.1931)

From “Toni Morrison: The Art of Fiction CXXXIV” (1993)*

morrison: Faulkner in Absalom, Absalom! spends the entire book tracing race,

and youcan'tfindit. No one can seeit, even the character whois black can't s ee

it. [.. .] Do you knowhow hardit is to withhold that kind of information but

hinting, pointing all of the time? And then to reveal it in order to saythatit is

not the point anyway? It is technically just astonishing. As a reader you have

been forced to huntfor a dropof black blood that mean s everything and noth-

ing. The insanity of racism.

MORRISON: [. . .] | wrote a story entitled “Recitatif,” in which there are twolittle

girls in an orphanage, one white and one black. But the reader doesn't know

which is white and whichis blac k. I use class codes, but noracial

codes.

INTERVIEWER:Is this meant to confuse the reader?

MoRRISON: Well, yes. But to provoke andenlighten. I did that as a lark. Wha

t

was exciting was to be forc ed as a writer not to be lazy

and rely on obvious

codes. Soon as I say, “Black w oman...” I can rest on or prov

oke predictable

responses, but if I leave it ou t then | have to talk about he

r in a complicated

way—as a person.

*“Toni Morrison: TheArt of Fi ction CXXXIV.” Interview by Eli

sa Schappell with Claudia

Brodsky Lacour. The Paris Review, no. 128, Fall 1993,

www.theparisreview.org/interviews

/1888/the-art-of-f iction-no-134-toni

-morrison,

a i e n e e n i n

DAVID FOSTER WALLACE Good People 245

DAVID FOSTER WALLACE (1962-2008)

Good People

Born in Ithaca, NewYork, to a philosophy professor

and an English teacher, David Foster Wallace has

been dubbed an “outrageously gifted novelist” and “the geniusof his generation,” as well as a “recovering

smartaleck” and “a decent, decent man.” A philoso-

phyand English major at Amherst College, he con-

Jated a career in math before—at age twenty-four—earning an MFA from the

temp : be a University of Arizona andpublishing his first novel, The

Broom of the System (1987).

His subsequent work includes short-storycollections like Brief Interviews with Hideous

Men (1999) and Oblivion (2006), as well as wide-ranging nonfiction, some of which

appears in A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again (1997) and Consider the Lobster

and Other Essays (2006). At over a thousand pages andwith almost four hundred foot-

notes, his most famousnovel, Infinite Jest (1996), i ntertwines several narratives set in a

near future in which years are namedbytheir corporate spons ors(“Year of the Whop-

per’) and New Englandis a giant toxic-waste dump. Includ ed on Time's list of the

hundred best novels published since 1923, it also helped earn Wallace a MacArthur

“genius grant.”

Wallace described his own goal as “morally passionate, passi onately moral fiction”

that might help readers “becomeless aloneinside.” Thou gh admired as muchforits

humorasforits bulk and complexity,his fiction often dwells on w hat he called “an ineluc-

table part of being a human’—“suffering.” Though Wallace long battled depression, his

2008 suicide shocked and saddened fansand fellow writers ar ound the world. The story

“Good People,”first published in 2007, ultimately becamepa rt of The Pale King (2011),

the unfinished novelhe left behind.

heywere up ona picnic table at that parkbythelake, by the edgeof the lake,

with part of a downedtree in the shallows half h idden by the bank. Lane A.

Dean,Jr., and hisgirlfriend, both in bluejeans and button-upshi rts. They sat up on

the table's top portion and had their shoes on the bench part that pe ople sat on to

Picnic or fellowship together in carefree times. They'd gon e to different high

schools but the samejunior college, where they had met in campus ministries. It

wasspringtime, and the park's grass wasvery green and the air suffused

with hon-

eysuckle andlilacs both, which was almost too muc h. There were bees, and the

angle of the sun made the waterof the shallows look dark. There had been mor

e

storms that week, with some downedtrees and the soundof chainsawsall up and

down his parents’ street. Their postures on the picnic table were b oth the same

forward kind with their shoulders rounded and elbows on their knees. In this posi-

tion the girl rocked slightly and onc e put her face in her hands, but sh

e was not

Crying. Lane was very still and immobile and looking past the bank at the downed

tree in the shallowsandits ball o f exposed roots going all direction

s and the trees

cloud of branches all half in th e water. The only other individua

l nearby was a

oo