Today in class we were talking about how Milkman seems like more of a receptacle for other people's stories than an agent in his own story, which is somewhat unusual for the main character of a novel. From the very start of his life, Milkman was conceived more as an idea of something that Ruth thought might help her be happy: "Her son had never been a person to her, a separate real person. He had always been a passion" (131), meant to provide a bond between Ruth and her husband. He is Ruth's "one aggressive act brought to royal completion" (133). Even after his birth, Milkman continues to be more important because of what he represents than who he is. This is even reflected in his nickname, which represents someone who comes from a vaguely depraved and potentially incestuous household -- a possibility which has a lot of importance later in the book.
Milkman himself seems to slowly realize this over the course of the book. Early on, when he's 12, he wants to hear stories, especially about Pilate. He begs his father to tell him why he considers her a "snake," and is upset when his father reminisces about his childhood and just says that Milkman has to trust him that she's a snake, without providing any concrete details. By the time he's 22, and presumably used to people telling him stories about their lives, since that's about all that ever happens to him, his opinions have changed. When his father explains, in explicit detail, why he hits Ruth, Milkman doesn't want to hear about it. He even says on page 78 that "[i]f he wanted me to lay off... why didn't he just say that?... But no. He comes to me with some way-out tale about how come and why." By this time in his life, Milkman prefers to hear the simple answer and doesn't want to get the reasons for why he is expected to behave a certain way.
Later on, at 31, Milkman has developed as a character in only one respect: now he doesn't just dislike hearing about other people's life stories, he actively resents it. He realizes that people treat him as a "garbage pail for the actions and hatreds of other people." That's basically what he is right from his birth: someone who represents something to everyone, but who doesn't actually have much of a personality himself. Everyone wants to lecture him about their lives or their ideas because he fits so well into all of it without even trying. Even to his best friend Guitar he's the perfect example of the what's wrong with middle class black people. The only people who seem to care about him as a person are Pilate (who may still have other reasons to care about him considering the amount of attention she pays to his life) and Hagar, who is for whatever reason completely in love with him. You could even argue that Hagar just values him as the idea of an attractive, respectable, and available future husband at an age where (as we see with Corinthians) that's getting harder and harder for her to find.
By the end of Part I, it seems like Milkman is starting to take things a little more into his own hands. He makes a half-hearted argument against Guitar's involvement with the Seven Days, and he starts to question why his father and Pilate care so much about him. He even has a minor moment of introspection as he waits for Hagar to try to murder him in Guitar's apartment. When he leaves the house after Lena yells at him about the negative impact he has on everyone in his family, it seems like he might finally be making a decision to change his life, although it's hard to see from here exactly where he's going to go.
I can see what you mean in part 1, but there's a curious disconnect when we go to Danville, PA, and Milkman hears stories about his grandpa and father. He is filled with an intense pride at being related to them and loves everything about the stories. He loves hearing about the exploits of Macon Dead I, he loves telling the guys about Macon Dead II's wealth. For some reason, these stories are far different to him than the stories his father and mother told him. In a similar way, Pilate's and Macon II's stories from that time interest him. It seems he like these stories, which are fun and filled with cheer (that is, the teller speaks them with the intention of making the listener happy) in strict opposition to the others of Macon II and Ruth, which are heavy and unusual (the teller intends them to make him feel negatively).
ReplyDeleteWe've sometimes talked in class as if Milkman's attitude toward hearing stories like this remains static throughout the first part, but your post is a good reminder that we do see a progression over the course of his first 31 years in this regard--almost as if the older he gets, and the less of an original "story" of his own he has, he resents all of this as "baggage" that he'd rather not have. Tristan's right, though, that we see the attitude shift again once he travels to Pa. By the end of the novel, flush with his new revelations about Solomon and Jake and Sing, he *can't wait* to tell Pilate all about it. The hesitant listener has now become the enthusiastic narrator. This is one way to mark his development as a character. (And, of course, the story of how he came to unpack this other story is itself a story--he's now had real experiences of his own to report.)
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