1. What are Paul D and Sethe remembering about Sweet Home? Why do you
think Morrison gives us the information little bit by little bit?
Ans. With the arrival of Paul D, Sethe and Paul remember their days back in
sweet home. Paul D and Sethe remember that ‘sweet home wasn’t sweet,
and sure wasn’t home’. She recalls how there was not a leaf on that farm that
did not make her want to scream and how it never looked as terrible it was
and it made her wonder if hell was a pretty place too. Paul’s memory takes
him back to when he first saw Sethe, holding her shoes and stockings up in
one hand, he skirts in the other with wet and shining legs. He also recalls
that she is Halle’s woman and that’s how the other sweet home men used to
refer her as, how she held so much emptiness inside her, her eyes like two
wells into which he had trouble gazing. Sethe was the only female out of the
five of them. When she arrived the five men decided to let her be and let the
‘iron-eyed’ girl choose for herself even though they were sick with the
absence of a woman. Furthermore, Sethe reminisces how she and her kids
escaped from sweet home. Her three children packed in a wagonload with
others in a caravan of Negroes crossing the river and she carried her fourth
child while she escaped, which is all she has got now. However, the
escaping has also caused her great pain as that’s when she was separated
from Halle and she till now didn’t know if he is alive or dead. Both Sethe
and Paul remember about the ‘the headless bride’ back in sweet home. Paul
reminds her about how she used to roam around the woods regularly.
Everyone who ran off from sweet home can’t stop talking about it, said
Sethe. Additionally, Paul remembers how Sweet home had the prettiest trees
than the farm around. He called his brother and sat under it or alone
sometimes with Halle or with the other Pauls, but more with Sixo. He
remembers how Sixo tried and tried to create the perfect night, cooked
potatoes but never succeeded, and the way Sixo once walked 17 hours to
spend one hour with a girl and 17 hours to walk home. Moreover, Sethe
recollects how she felt fine, not scared of the men beyond. When they slept
around her in quarter near her, but never came hear her. Even when she
brought food for them to the fields, bacon and bread wrapped in a piece of
clean sheeting, they never took it from her hands. They stood back and
waited for her to put it on the ground and leave. Sethe often hid behind the
honeysuckle and watched them to see if they act differently when she is not
around them. She also cherished the memory of her getting married to Halle
in secrecy, Sethe and Halle married in the corn field- the corn swaying. Toni
Morrison gave us information in bits and pieces to compare the characters
past and present which gives the readers a better understanding of the
situation. Also, there are a lot of characters and a lot of conflicts associated
with the characters so it would be hard for the readers to contemplate.
2. What new information do we learn about Sweet Home in this chapter,
specifically about Denver’s birth?
Ans. Denver passionately desires a history. This is often evident in her
obsessive must to reconstruct the events of her birth in much detail. Sethe
describes Denver’s birth as a thin whipping snow very like the picture she
had painted resembling the circumstances of Denver’s birth in a canoe
straddled by a white girl for whom she was named. Birds chirping in the
thick woods, the crunch of leaves underfoot and Sethe was making her way
to the top hill, still six months pregnant with Denver. Sethe had to face a lot
of difficulties escaping from sweet home to reach the horizon of the hill as
her feet were swollen, and her leg shaft ended in a loaf of flesh scalloped by
five toenails, her dress was so milky and sticky that it attracted every flying
thing from grasshoppers to gnats, all her body parts were numb and dead
however she managed to keep her little ‘antelope’ alive, blades of wild
onions were scratching her temple and her cheek. Sethe refers to her baby as
antelope as Sethe, just like her unborn child, had never seen on. She guessed
it must have been an invention held on to from before Sweet Home, when
she was very young. Sethe told Denver that a something came up out of the
earth, who she thought was a white man. She described the white girl as
“raggediest-looking trash you ever saw”, arms like cane stalks and enough
hair for four or five heads. She spoke so much it wasn’t clear how she could
breathe at the same time. The white girl’s name was Amy Denver, who had
been a white indentured servant who was on the run to Boston to get herself
some velvet, in a store called ‘Wilson’ Sethe disguised herself as “Lu” as
she couldn’t risk her and her baby’s life and go back to sweet home. Amy
suggested her a place where she could spend at, a house back yonder, so
Sethe could save herself from the sake that might bite her. Sethe crawled and
Amy walked alongside her, and when Sethe needed to rest, Amy stopped too
and spoke some more about Boston. On Amy and Sethe’s entire trip the
antelope seemed to be quite and grazing, it never bucked once. She lifted
Sethe’s feet and massaged them, hence Denver was named after Amy.
3. a) What does it tell us literally about the characters and what they are
experiencing?
b) What is significant about the quote? Does it have a deeper meaning than
the one it holds in this context? Does it contain any literary devices that
make it beautiful or interesting?
“They were not holding hands, but their shadows were.”
Ans a) The shadows of Denver, Paul D, and Sethe were gliding over each
other looking like they were holding hands when they really were separated from
each other.
b) Sethe began to believe maybe she what Paul D spoke about having a life could
be true. She thought that they all could live as a family. The shadow is symbolic of
the bond that Sethe is expecting to have between the trio. The literary device used
could be foreshadowing and metaphor.