Monday, December 5, 2011
Meursault vs Ruth: Innocence, sympathy, and morals
Thus far in Song of Solomon, I have already observed many similarities between it and the books that came earlier in the semester. One comparison in particular caught my attention as I wrote my research paper on a similar subject. The issue has to do with serious moral failings but ambiguous reactions by the reader due to the innocence or naivety of the character involved. My comparison is between Ruth and her sexual encounters with her father and son and Meursault and him murdering the Arab. For some reason, I find Meursault a much more sympathetic character than Ruth. Even though his crime would be considered worse by courts, his innocence of consequence in the world is more compelling than Ruth's supposed innocence of the wrongness of her sexual endeavors. In all honesty, I think it is introducing sex into the equation that makes Ruth's innocence so much less believe. Sex is often used as a symbol of loss of innocence so when Morrison says Ruth is innocent in issues that have to do with sex it was difficult for me to sympathize with her. This ambiguous state of affairs foreshadows what Ruth later tells us about herself, her father, and Milkman's father.
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But Ruth herself remains so childlike, even in her own self-description as "small." It's still not entirely clear to me that we have to read her late nursing of Milkman or her intense love for her father as inherently sexual, although there is a sense that she wants to express love but doesn't have a clear sense of boundaries, and so she almost inadvertently spills over into this realm. But in both cases, the perception of harm comes from the observer (Freddie and Macon).
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