Recitatif

In Toni Morrison's "Recitatif," it is difficult to discern which of the girls, Roberta and Twyla, is black and which is white. I did pick up on what I thought were certain clues as to which is which, but even still I am not 100%. One of the instances that made me think maybe Twyla was white was early in the story, when Twyla notes "it didn't matter that we looked like salt and pepper standing there" (3542). I thought this implied that Twyna was white and Roberta was black, as people generally make a point to put themselves first when speaking. Yet this wasn't absolute proof. When the mothers met, it had me feeling a different way. Roberta's mother does not speak to Twyla or her mother, and has them walk away from her and her mother. This made me think Roberta may be white, as it signifies racism on her mother's part. Another clue was a little further into the story, where Roberta is going to see Jimi Hendrix. I couldn't take much from that, but Morrison later writes, "A black girl and a white girl meeting in a Howard Johnson's on the road and having nothing to say. One in a blue-and-white triangle waitress hat, the other on her way to see Hendrix" (3549). This made me think, since she has it in order, that Twyla is black.

These are just some of clues I picked up on, and I know there are probably way more. Yet from what I interpreted, Twyla was black, and Roberta was white. Thoughts?

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Recitatif

This weeks assignment-to determine the race of each girl-was difficult. I read Recitatif, by Toni Morrison several times to make a determination about who was Black and who was White.  I thought Twyla was Black and Roberta was White.  The first sign of racism was when the girls' mothers met at the shelter.  Roberta's mother, "...looked down at me and the looked down at Mary too." (3545) She grabs Roberta's hand and walks to the back of the line.  The inference to me was Roberts's mother was looking down on them not only because she was so tall but because of Twyla's race. Later, when the girls are older they met at Howard Johnsons were Twyla is a waitress.  Several things in this encounter pointed to race. The first was Roberta was on her way to the coast to see Hendrix, which had a mostly white following.  Twyla is once again in the position of being looked down on, she is snubbed by Roberta.  Roberta  does not seem to want to talk to Twyla.  She laughs about the town Twyla lives in.  She doesn't invite her to sit down with them,"A silence it was her turn to fill up. With introductions, maybe, to her boyfriends or an invitation to sit down and have a Coke." (3546)  Roberta seems to be uncomfortable and embarrassed by Twyla and their friendship.  The next meeting between them is at the gourment grocery store, not the kind of grocery store that Twyla normally shops in.  As they are talking and catching up, Roberta says she lives in Annandale. Twyla wonders to herself how did Roberta go from Hendrix to a,"...neighborhood full of doctors and IBM executives."(3548) Roberta and her husband are probably white because of the neighborhood they live in and he is executive at IBM, there were not many if any Black executives at IBM in the 1970s. Twyla also thinks to herself,"Everything is so easy for them. They think they own the world." (3548) I took that as a reference to living in a world dominated by White people and how they seem to be able to have whatever they want. The next exchange between the two is the picket line where Roberta is opposed to busing and integration. Roberta says, "Well, it is a free country." (3551) Twyla's response is," Not yet, but it will be."(3551).  Twyla does not see the world as free because of racism but she is hopeful that things will change.  The last meeting between the two women at the diner has Roberta asking what happened to Maggie.  Roberta is feeling guilty about her prejudge toward Maggie, who is Black, and that fact she never helped Maggie.  A collective guilt of one race regarding the other race.

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What is race?

Black or white was the question that went through my mind as I first read Morrison’s “Recitatif” Is Twyla or Roberta black or white.  I started thinking what would leave me to believe one way or the other and I realized that by making any assumptions you were showing your cultural generalizations.  I think Morrison was very clever in making the reader believe one way or the other without specifically identifying one race.  In the beginning of the story Morrison writes, “It was one thing to be taken out of your own bed early in the morning-it was something else to be stuck in a strange place with a girl from a whole other race.” (Morrison 3541). Nowhere was it identified that the races were black and white. It could have been White, Hispanic, Asian, or black.  Did Morrison deliberately not clarify the races of Twyla and Roberta so that the individual reader would have to define their own stereotypical ideas of race?   In the middle of the story it also seems to take a detour about the characters themselves. Twyla seemed to be the street wise kid where Roberta was the simple-minded naïve girl but later in the story suddenly Roberta is the hardened free-wild child and Twyla is the conservative hardworking waitress. I didn’t know what to make of Maggie and the different version that each remember. Does it show that your interpretation depends on your race?  Twyla remembers Maggie as “Sandy-colored” but Roberta insists that she is black. Why is this significant?

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Humanity: People First

The story of Twyla and Roberta is simply profound. As recent events within our home town shows, race is still, unfortunately, a large issue in our society. The powerful nature of Morrison’s short story derives from the fact that she does not entail the race of either girl, yet race is subtly mentioned throughout the story. From the introductions of Twyla, I pictured her as a caucasian in my head. As Roberta talks to Twyla she says, “Maybe I’m different now, Twyla. But you’re not. You’re the same little state kid who kicked the poor old black lady when she was down on the ground. You kicked a black lady and you have the nerve to call me a bigot”(Morrison3552). I felt Roberta’s condescending tone as well as the emphasis of Maggie being a “black lady” made my perception of Twyla more concrete. It was almost as if Roberta was saying Twyla was twice as guilty for kicking a black lady because she is white. It felt as though a crime against another race was doubly as bad. I believe that Roberta was African American. Several times within the short story, Roberta mentions “blacks and whites,” but the word black is always put before the word white in her dialect. Often times, we put self first in our own dialect out of natural habit. When talking to Twyla, Roberta says, “you know how it was in those days: black-white”(Morrison3550). Roberta’s repetition of the the sequence in which she stated “black and white” made me believe she was African American. 

I find that class issues are equally as divisive as racial issues. Unfortunately, there is still a separation amongst differing people of our country and the world. There are many stereotypes that follow the many races as well. Racism and as well as the convinced superiority of oneself will not dissipate until we teach our children tolerance and understanding. We need to become a people first society. Bring forth humanity and we will have peace. 

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