It is critical to keep in mind that Bonner spends Lee’s transformation so you’re able to gauge the options and troubles of your societal domaine of which the type flees
ville seemed very ineffective and you can bare of any beauty you to Lee began to would you like to you to she had passionate an additional recommendations. dating woosa . . . It needed to be seen courtesy-and resided as a consequence of-otherwise battled because of- like her own dilemmas” (165). Bonner uses that it semirural wilderness so you’re able to exteriorize Lee’s dilemmas and permit the character so you can hook up the situations unfolding just before the girl into world she’s got temporarily discontinued. Having a physical barrenness similar to The latest Red-colored Rose, Tootsville gets a web page where Lee normally situate the lady struggle with Mrs. Sands from inside the framework away from before tragedies: the newest untimely death of her parents, the annulment of a disappointed very first relationship, together with death of the girl former husband within the an intoxicated-driving accident. Through this procedure for dislocation, meditation, and you may reorientation, Lee actually starts to escape the newest oppressive come to away from Mrs. Sands and also the black colored bourgeoisie she symbolizes. The brand new defining minute of Lee’s excursion boasts another thematic come back, here compared to that out-of marriage given that computed, commonly unholy wedlock. Drawn to help good harried mommy just who she encounters about street, Lee finds out by herself brand new unwitting facilitator from and you will experience on marriage of the female’s teenage child, Annie Mae, and boyfriend with just who this lady has already been detained towards a great morals costs. The newest ensuing jailhouse nuptials not only reflect brand new unceremonious tenor out-of Lee’s earliest wedding also establish some other instance of wedding due to the fact this new strategic repairs out-of social acquisition: it’s unsure whether or not Annie Mae’s mommy is more concerned about the girl daughter’s premarital sex or just around the newest hearsay one to sex often generate. The brand new criteria of one’s teenager’s relationships situate the lady midway between the youthful romanticism you to powered Lee on the girl illadvised basic relationships and you may the fresh tragicomic proportions of the fresh matrimonial spectacle into the “For the Altar.” No matter what part out of private passion regarding the indiscretion whereby Annie Mae are detained, her mom’s insistence shoots the newest ceremony meant to approve they. Bonner’s portrayal of all of the about three times-Beth’s, Lee’s, and you will Annie Mae’s-evokes “a significantly political, feminist craving so you’re able to write [the] patriarchal strictures” of one’s Victorian ideals out-of relationship and you can real womanhood.67 But not much wedding as the public deal could possibly get bolster caste, category, or battle, some great benefits of for example agreements to help you Bonner’s emails, particularly the female, are usually debatable. In connection with this Lee’s have a problem with Mrs. Sands is not only a matter of child against mother-in-rules in addition to among individual tend to up against public orthodoxy. Even if Lee suppresses the impulse to eliminate Annie Mae’s marriage, the experience will bring this lady which have an increased focus on this lady set-and you will agency-from inside the course of females sacrificed so you’re able to and you will circumscribed because of the notions 90
When Mrs
of obligations, award, and you may propriety. Sands financing the girl daughter-in-law’s heirloom china towards the “aristocratic” Brewsters, brand new blog post-Tootsville Lee was at last able to conflict her mother-in-law’s specious front from exceptionality and you will contingent states from society: “There are certain things on your own son’s family- (which is the house also)-that don’t belong to the son! One teas set is actually exploit! You’d no straight to touching some thing in the right here versus asking me!” (174). In reclaiming the fresh teas put, a sign of bourgeois mores and out-of individual background, Lee really works new twice move off saying their reputation in the group that Mrs. Sands polices and you can reclaiming the girl title because a different are exactly who is more than the lady partner’s appendage. Lee’s getting rejected out-of their mother-in-law’s intrusive visibility reinforces this lady rejection of the older female’s exclusionary attention of people. Breaking the exact and you can figurative quiet enveloping almost every other Bonner protagonists, Lee ultimately demands a personal-laid out lifetime free from the newest psychological and you will spatial constraints put because of the others. She does not want to are now living in one “Black colored Ghetto,” should it be a perfectly decorated refuge inside her home otherwise good socially stifling ambiance inside her society. On returning household, Lee viewpoints her landscaping having a angle and you can, for the first time in her own constant fight with Mrs. Sands, reconsiders their husband’s position within controversial house: “ ‘Why-he has got viewed just how hatefully highhanded their mom will likely be-until then!’ Sample swiftly thanks to Lee’s mind” (175). When you look at the location Lee’s companion just like the a potential friend, Bonner reinforces the woman critique of your own beliefs portrayed by the Mrs. Sands and destabilizes massive notions of black colored bourgeoisie. Inside their joined stay resistant to the hypocrisy and you may snobbery out of an old generation, Lee and her spouse, for instance the Yellow Flower’s Sweet and you will Most readily useful Bloodstream, highly recommend the hope out-of a younger, alot more modern age group, you to that your self-alert image regarding Bonner’s “Toward Becoming Young-a woman-and you can Colored” and you will “The young Blood Hungers” you are going to belong. Instead of confidence strict 19th-100 years personal dictates because the Gran and Mrs. Sands manage, these types of choice modernist rates instead make use of early-twentieth-millennium currents of societal change and you will self-determination. Also, Bonner in addition to prevents romanticizing the working-category form one to prompts Lee’s reevaluation regarding the girl early in the day. There aren’t any outlying (African) pastorals as a whole finds from inside the Lacascade’s Claire-Solange. On the other hand Bonner, presenting this new Tootsville letters because the simple mortals whoever real, most human failings push Lee to examine her very own rules and regulations, will not portray Annie Mae along with her mom given that 91
