Not the Nurturing Kind: The Monstrous Mother Figures in Toni Morrison's Novels

Yi-Lin Yu

the outraged/monstrous mother figure ； Toni Morrison ； black/Afrocentric motherhood

小說與戲劇

17期（2007 / 03 / 01）

43 - 65

英文

Motherhood is a predominant theme in Toni Morrison's novels. Through representing the figure of outraged mother, Morrison has joined a line of African-American women writers in featuring this ”ancestral presence.” The recurrence of outraged mother figure in African-American women's texts marks its significance of ”Bearing witness” to the tribulations and traumas undergone by the African Americans, especially under slavery. More noteworthy is the powerful defensive forces unleashed by the outraged mother with an aim to safeguard the physical and spiritual well-being of her progeny in times of danger. The existence of the outraged mother is seen as vital to the endangered black race owing to her embodiment of essential merits such as ”nurturance, protection, and self-sacrifice.” Although Morrison undoubtedly follows this trend popularized by her predecessors and corroborated by her contemporaries, her rendition of the outraged mother figure appears to be more outrageous than her counterparts. Apart from portraying the archetypal outraged mother figure, Morrison also delineates a kind of monstrous mother who commits the most frightening crime of murdering her child. The most famous example of the kind is Sethe in Beloved, but so is her counterpart Eva in Sula though their grave misconduct is carried out in rather different circumstances. Sethe's infanticide is understandable and she suffers from the haunting of her slaughtered daughter while Eva's slaying of her son reinforces her image as a resolute but domineering mother who divulges neither guilt nor repentance for her most unnatural action. This emergence of monstrous mother figures is ubiquitous in Morrison's novels, especially in her first six ones. In addition to those murderous mothers, there are also others who abuse, neglect, and abandon their children. In other words, Morrison repeatedly presents the most horrifying family drama in which the heart-rending stories of failed mothers and unmothered children are played out. In stark contrast to the nurturing, protective, and self-sufficient image of a typical outraged mother, the destructive and infamous performance of monstrous mothers map out a totally different contour of motherhood which somewhat refutes the ”Afrocentric” concept of motherhood as noted by the renowned feminist maternal scholar, Patricia Hill Collins. Partly thanks to the problematic nature of these monstrous mother figures, most feminist maternal scholars, including even those of African American, have focused their exploration more on the growth-enhancing side of African American mothering than on the undesirable aspect of these unfit mothers. Based on this observation, this paper will delve into this largely unexplored territory of monstrous mother figures by investigating the ways in which Morrison deploys them to convey her contention of African American motherhood in search of a new synthesis. The presence of these monstrous mothers not only replays the historical precedents of ruptured black motherline and community but also highlights Morrison's creative experimentation with the outraged mother figure that in turn distinguishes her from her predecessors and contemporaries. Although cast in a negative and uncanny manner, the monstrous mother figures are, I would argue, also viewed as a contested site where the assumed prescriptions of black motherhood and cultural values are questioned, refined and expanded.

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