Sula 1 and 2

I think that this book, Sula, is pretty interesting. I have enjoyed it. The topic of racism and the distinction of whites vs. blacks is also present in this novel like other books we have read this semester such as, The Sound and The Fury and The Invisible Man. Also the book seems like it is a lot about the “good” and the “bad”. Nel and Sula are best friends, and Nel seems to be the good one and Sula the bad. The first thing that happens which is very shocking is when Sula is swinging Chicken Little and he slips and falls into the river and drowns. That was accidental but I can’t believe that nothing is done about it and they just act like nothing happened. From there Nel became the good wife and mom while Sula goes against the norms. After Nel’s wedding Sula leaves for ten years. While she is gone she has a lot of interracial relationships (w/ white men) who are married nonetheless. After she returns back to Bottom she tops it all off by having an affair with her bestfriend Nel’s husband. That definately doesn’t make Sula look too good. Sula and Nel stop being friends for a while after that but they kind of make up before Sula dies. There was definately a lot of interesting things that went on in this book and I believe the main topics were race, roles of women, and good and bad, right and wrong.

Overall I think Sula was a pretty good book, it reminded me a lot of the other books that we have read this semester if you concentrate on the themes of the book. I think that the end of Sula kind of leaves you hanging though. Because with Sula’s death it leaves Nel and her relationship unresolved. They obviously had a lot of things that happened between them that needed to be talked about, beginning with watching the death of Chicken Little and ending with Sula having an affair with Nel’s husband and everything in between. All of those things were left unmentioned between the two best friends and neither of them got any closure before Sula’s death. The topic of death in this book is really interesting, seeing as though nothing seems to really be done when Chicken Little dies and then when Sula dies the community is actually happy. I found that really weird, Sula did do some awful things but people aren’t usually happy when someone dies. Also with Sula around she was blamed for all the bad things that happened, she was definitely the focus and kind of the community’s scapegoat. Now with her gone who are they going to blame things on? The Community I think is going to have to start taking responsibility for their own actions, including Nel. Sula did do an awful thing to Nel but Nel blamed Sula unfairly for much more than that, Eva helps Nel realize this. Nel always blamed Sula 100% for Chicken Little’s death even though she was also there. So at the end of the book Nel goes to Sula’s grave and cries out her name, did she forgive her? Is she saying sorry? Or maybe a both while mourning at the same time, I guess it’s up to the reader to decide what they think.