"There can't be anyone, I am sure, who doesn't know what it feels like to be disliked, even rejected, momentarily or for sustained periods of time...When this happens, it is some consolation to know that the dislike or hatred is unjustified -- that you don't deserve it."
When I read the first line, I agreed. What kid hasn't been passed over for the kickball team, or the last one to find a buddy for partner time? I know one of my constant complaints as a small child were about being rejected by the other kids in my grade. But when I read that second sentence, I immediately thought one thing:
"She can't possibly mean the dislike I've experienced -- I'm not black. I haven't had to endure the same kind of dislikes she has. Clearly my rejections have not been the same. I'm not worthy to compare the two." And that troubled me.
In my communication class we've learned that when two people have a conversation, there are actually six people talking, three for each of the participants. There is my perception of me (white, middle class, college student, female, brown hair, silly), my perception of you (what you look like, what I know about you from previous conversations, the circumstances we got into this conversation) and my perception of what you think of me (you must think I'm a smart ass for saying that, you look like you don't like my hair, you obviously think I'm racist for saying this.) The same goes for the other party.
Reading a book, I just realized, is much the same way. You approach a text the way you approach speaking to another person. There's what you know about yourself, what you know about the author, and what you think the author wants you to get out of the story. Unfortunately in the case of a book, there is only one person on the other end -- the text itself, unmoderated, unassuming. Of course, we might say that the author has already considered the other side of the conversation when they were writing the book, but that is subject to your interpretation. You are the only lens. Of course, other lenses can be added to the three I've just mentioned -- what other people want you to get out of the book, why you are reading the book (reading for class or reading for fun can totally discolor your picture) what you think other people will think of you for getting what you get out of a book, and dozens more.
There's something Lacanian about all this, some Big Otherish quality that governs the discourse between book and reader. Pre-conditioned responses have already been embedded into my system, and apparently one of them is to step away any time a black author tries to involve me in the shared feeling of remorse and say "But I'm not on the same level as you."
This is troublesome indeed, and I'm not entirely sure I know how to solve that. On the one hand, it is true -- not being picked for the kickball team is by no means the same as being rejected from the social network of your classroom by your peers because you are black and do not look like the beauty ideal of Shirley Temple in any way, as Pecola is in The Bluest Eye.
On the other hand, I think one solution would be to affirm that while the situations are different, they are also somewhat the same, which is what Morrison was trying to do with that opening line of her preface in the first place. By acknowledging that difference and respecting it we can move forward in the discussion. This was something we talked about last year with Sister Mara. In an essay she presented to us, the author of the essay, a white woman who does a significant amount of scholarship on Toni Morrison's work, talked about how she felt inadequate (not quite the right word) when it came time for her to present her work because she wasn't black and therefore couldn't possibly understand Morrison's work the way it was meant to be understood. Eventually, however, she realized she could reconcile this by owning up to the similarities between the experiences of women of both races (backgrounds, upbringings -- I really don't know what word to use here, either, race being a loaded word) and by comparing the differences. By owning up to the difference and respecting it she was able to become more comfortable with the concept.
So yes, Ms. Toni Morrison, Nobel Prize Winner and writer of fantastically good fiction, I do know what it's like to feel like you don't measure up to standards of perfection. I know what it's like to be rejected. Please share with me your thoughts and experiences on the subject. Because that’s the reason we read, isn’t it? We read to understand other people’s experiences more.
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