Role of friendship in identity formation

Student’s name

Professor

Course Date

Role of friendship in identity formation

The novel Sula by Morrison portrays and describes different issues found in the society expressed through the different characters he employs in the novel. Some of these characters include Nel, Sula, Chicken Little, Eva, Hannah among other characters. All these characters express a trait which can be linked closely to a real life situation. Therefore it is important to question as well as use the novel to understand the world around us in a better manner. Morrison especially brings out the friendships between Nel and Sula as a very strong factor and theme in the novel. It is this theme I will look at in this literary analysis. The main purpose of this is to determine the role of life-long friendships and relationships in the formation of a person’s identity. This is because to a great extent Nel and Sula have a life-long bond which affects each of them in a certain manner.

In the world there exists good and evil which Morrison articulates through the characters Nel and Sula. This good and evil is a part and parcel of life. Morrison creatively and clearly shows the reader that Nel was good from an outward expression of behaviour and character. However this is goodness borrowed or perpetuated by the manner in which she is brought up by her mother who is very perfect in everything she does. This sense of being perfect is what also attracts Sula to go to their house every once in a while to visit Nel because she feels better to get away from her home which in most times is full of chaos. Therefore the friendship of Nel and Sula is a clear depiction of good meeting bad from an external point of view. This is because Nel is perfect and Sula is imperfect.

However in real life situation goodness and the sense of being bad does not exist on its own or in certain people. This is very clearly displayed in the manner in which Nel struggles to retain what is already believed about her by most people that she is good. This displays the struggles every person goes through about life. It is a lesson that even though we always want to be good we can never be fully good. It is also a lesson that we cannot be bad or negative forever. Therefore life becomes a continuous struggle just like seen in their lives whereby Nel struggles to retain the goodness while Sula struggles to be a better good.

The struggle to be good is in different levels. Nel struggles at first with her nose which her mother never liked. Sula struggles with her mother’s behaviour Sula who kept men coming at her house for sexual acts which are seen to corrupt the mind of the little Sula. Therefore the struggles to be better and to get out of the bondage of being seen as good continue internally in the inner side of Nel and Sula. This is a contrasting situation whereby Morrison tries to inform the reader that it is very possible and okay for people from different kinds of backgrounds to come together and be friends for life. To some extent Morrison tries to show the reader how good exists within the bad and how bad exists within the good. He tries to prove the fact that for one to be a full human being they must have all parts of humanity. From a different angle of view he tries to inform the reader that good and bad have to exist together and that is the reason he brings Nel and Sula together to be best friends for life. The act of being friends for so long neutralises the bad in Sula and reduces the perfection in Nel so that there is found a balance in their lives. This at the end leads to the formation of their character and who they become as they grow up.

The friendship of Nel and Sula helped them form the character of what they become because they found similar things which identified them. These to an extent were their strengths and to some other extent were challenges or even weaknesses. Some of these include the fact that they were females, that they were blacks among other reasons. Therefore the discovery of these issues which they both belonged to united them and made them even closer, to be there for one another because they viewed the world with lack of trust. They also viewed the world as one which did not value women so much and the male chauvinism was very great. This even became worse when the ladies were black as they were. Therefore the challenges brought them together and their coming together became strength for then. “Because each had discovered years before that they were neither white nor male, and that all freedom and triumph was forbidden to them, they had set about creating something else to be” (Morrison, 85). Therefore Morrison tries to explain to the reader that even those groups of people oppressed in the society can become stronger if they get together for a common purpose. However this is not always easy. Just like Nel and Sula came together became friends because of their uniting factors the people who are oppressed or even if not oppressed those who have common features can come together and create something beautiful.

When they come together they not only enjoy the fruits of being together but is contribute to the formation of their character. If contributes in whom they become because they are able to see the world in a different manner or from a different viewpoint; a viewpoint of their new friends and partners. This same thing applies to Nel and Sula in the novel. After becoming friends with Sula Nel sees the world in a more different manner than the perfect way in which her mother had shown her. She begins to see the world in way of conflicts and many other undesirable issues. This she learns from Sula. This is always very important in any occasion as it shows the person what to expect and to form their behaviour to be ready for it. Sula also gets to see how such an orderly life is possible and she gets excited about it. This happens as she admires the life of Nel’s home where by a person can sit and be at peace. Therefore this environment brought to her by her friendship to Sula teaches her to yearn and create this type of perfect home which a person will not have to deal with a lot of things happening every now and then as it was the case with her family home.

Lifetime friendships also teach a person the art of keeping secrets. This is because even though it might be right to say some things it may only put a person into more danger. This is clear when the boy Chicken Little dies. Even though it hurts them that he had to die in their hands it is very difficult for them to say the truth because they are the only two people who know what happened. Saying the truth means as well that they will get into judicial problems and therefore they have to keep this secret. Therefore even though both felt guilty, they had to keep a low profile concerning the death of Chicken Little.

There is also the issue of trust which is very clearly shown in the friendship of Nel and Sula. Even though these two friends had shared everything in their lifetime it was very difficult for them to share Jude who was Nel’s husband. Jude had liked both of them when they were young and they kept close together. Nel and Sula shared even sexual partners and they were very close to one another. This shows that lifelong friendship has to come with knowing each other and depending on that to build one. It also comes along with the issue of knowing what to expect and what to do at different times so that one can accommodate their friends and not hurt them just like Nel and Sula always tried to do. This goes to the creation of their characters and behaviours in the fact that they both become dependent on each other and learn how to treat each other rather than just being selfish as most people tend to be. Trust issues come in when Jude and Nel slept together and this really hurt Sula. Therefore even though they were used to sharing sex partners this was way above the normal sex partners they had before. It is a lesson to the reader that it is okay to be close to one another but people are different when it comes to some kind of relationships like marriage.

The above incidences in the novel teach us of how good and important to see life in both ways that is to see life as good as well as seeing life and negative as well. This is because it is a reality of life. The formation of a person’s identity is mainly influenced by the people one interacts with and this forms their behaviours which determine the kind of people they are. Therefore Nel and Sula are friends who influence the behaviours of each other and at the end it determines how they relate with the outside world.

Works cited

Bjork, Patrick Bryce. “The novels of Toni Morrison: The search for self and place within the community.” (1991): 1226-1226.

Middleton, David L., ed. Toni Morrison’s fiction: Contemporary criticism. Routledge, 2016.Morrison, Toni. Sula. SPERLING & KUPFER, 2012.