“Recitatif” (1983)

1. “Recitatif” (1983) Toni Morrison

2. Toni Morrison (b.1931) • Winner of 1993 Nobel Prize for literature, first African American to receive this prize • Born in Lorain, Ohio, basis for some of her fictional settings • B.A., Howard Univ.; M.A., Cornell, thesis on Woolf and Faulkner; taught at Howard Univ. • Editor for Random House publishers • Novels include The Bluest Eye (1970), Sula (1974), Song of Solomon (1977), Beloved (1987), Jazz (1992), Paradise (1988), Love (2003)

4. Toni Morrison (b.1931) • Criticism: Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the American Literary Imagination (1992) • Professor of Humanities at Princeton University • Themes: American race relations, history and memory • “Recitatif” (1983) is Morrison’s sole published short story • A “recitatif” or “recitative” is “a vocal style in which a text is declaimed in the rhythm of natural speech with slight melodic variation” (American Heritage College Dictionary, 3rd ed., 1997). The story is Twyla’s recitatif.

7. Doubles • “Recitatif” is a story of doubles, one black and one white, but the reader can’t say for sure which is which • Similarities to Poe’s “William Wilson”: first-person narration; early institutional experience (school/orphanage); meetings at intervals later in life; narrator is challenged and hurt by the double • But “Recitatif” ends with their reconciliation

8. Doubles • Both are misfits in the orphanage: they don’t have “beautiful dead parents in the sky” (2255); their mothers are alive: • Twyla’s mother dances late • Robert’s is sick • Bad students: • Twyla “couldn’t remember” things (2254) • Roberta can’t read

9. Racial Ambiguity • 2253 Roberta “a girl from a whole other race” (but which?) • 2254 “like salt and pepper” • 2259 “Everything is so easy for them. They think they own the world” • 2262 “how it was in those days: black—white” • 2262-65 bussing (to integrate schools black & white): Twyla’s son Joseph is getting bussed; but Roberta’s kids face the same prospect

10. Historical Structure (age 8 is definite, later ages are estimates) Twyla and Roberta meet at different ages, in different settings: • at 8 (orphanage, 4 months) • at roughly 18-20 (Howard Johnson’s on thruway near Kingston, NY, August) • Twyla a nightshift waitress • Roberta passing through with two men, going to see (Jimi) Hendrix, whom Twyla calls “she” • Roberta and men laugh at Twyla, don’t say goodbye

11. Jimi Hendrix (1942-1970)

12. Historical Structure • at roughly 30-32 (Food Emporium, Newburgh, NY, late June) • key to ages on page 2260: about 20 yrs after orphanage; 12 yrs after Howard Johnson’s; Twyla’s son Joseph in junior high school (about 12 yrs old) • Twyla married to James Benson, a fireman, with son Joseph: middle class • Roberta married to Kenneth Norton, in computer industry: wealthy--limo & servants—in “a neighborhood full of doctors and IBM executives” (2259); 4 stepchildren

13. Historical Structure • At roughly 30-32 (Picket-lines, Fall) • Twyla, pro-bussing • Roberta, anti-bussing • “I wonder what made me think you were different” • “I wonder what made me think you were different” (2263) • Roberta betrays Twyla: refuses to help: “no receiving hand was there” (2263)

14. Historical Structure • At roughly 30-32 (Picket lines, Fall) • Twyla’s and Roberta’s identities are defined in relation to one another: “Actually my sign didn’t make sense without Roberta’s” (signs depend on one another) (2264) • Later 30s (coffee shop, Christmas Eve); Joseph in college (about 18) • Reconciliation, but Maggie issue still unresolved

15. Historical Structure • This story of doubles is suspended through recent American history: • Race relations • Bussing (to integrate schools) • Computer industry • Changes in town of Newburgh, New York: once “upstate paradise,” then half “on welfare,” with new wealthy tech class working for IBM

16. Archetypal Structure • Easter (2255), Christmas (2265) • Story of Maggie—a mute woman—also partakes of archetypal structure: this is a story of primal guilt which (like the story of Adam and Eve) takes place in a garden, an apple orchard • See 2254 • “gar girls” (corruption of gargoyles, “the evil stone faces” [2260]): associated with evil, like the gargoyles of medieval Gothic cathedrals

17. Gargoyles, Notre Dame, Paris

18. The Significance of Maggie: • Shifting memories/ shifting meanings: • Maggie fell (2245) • Maggie didn’t fall, was knocked down (2261) • Twyla and Roberta both kicked Maggie, who was black (2264) • Twyla didn’t kick Maggie, but wanted to (associated Maggie with her mother) (2265) • Roberta didn’t kick Maggie, but wanted to (associated Maggie with her own mother) (2266)

19. Klondike ice cream bars Tab Yoo-Hoo Chiclets Elmer’s glue IBM A&P The Wizard of Oz The Price Is Right The Brady Bunch Jimi Hendrix Consumer Culture: name-brand products, corporations, TV shows, pop icons:

20. Setting • “Recitatif” takes place in impermanent, transient settings. What effect or significance might this feature of setting have? • Orphanage • Howard Johnson’s • New shopping mall/parking lot • Picket lines • Coffee house

21. Conclusion • As doubles, Twyla and Roberta share an uncomfortable past • Roberta challenges Twyla to remember parts of her past Twyla prefers to forget • Reality and repressed desire get mixed up • In the present, they are one another’s racial and class “other” • They collaborate to reconstruct their shared past and bridge their differences of class and race • But what happened to Maggie?