Many writers use certain motives in their stories to portray a major point or theme. When trying to doing this, authors go about it in many different ways. Some may be very blunt, coming right out and saying it, some may use examples to portray their point or theme, or some, like Toni Morrison in, “Recititaf,” may express ambiguity within the characters of the novel. There are many reasons why an author like she does this. The ambiguity of race of the two main characters hinges on the personal belief of Toni Morrison, and what she thinks and feels about race. The narrator in “Recitatif,” by Toni Morrison, decides not to mention the ethnicity of both the main characters to show her point of view on race—her ambiguity of the races ultimately expresses her feeling on it. Toni Morrison was purposely ambiguous in writing about the race of the characters for a couple of reasons. First, she does this to keep the story rather interesting, grasping the readers’ attention throughout. Lines like, “so for the moment it didn’t matter that we looked like salt and pepper standing there and that’s what the other kids called us sometimes” (Morrison 1), and, “She just likes to dance all night” (Morrison 1), definitely keep the readers asking: “Which one is called salt and which one is called pepper?” and, “What does, ‘dancing all night’ exactly mean? This ‘job’ does not give me insight on race at all.” Right off the bat, Toni Morrison is able to keep the attention of the readers by keeping certain things like the race, ambiguous. Second, Toni Morrison keeps the races unknown to express her point of view on race overall. By not jumping right out and stating the race of the characters, it is safe to conclude that race does not matter to the author.
Historically, most African Americans, like Toni Morrison, do not put much emphasis on race, since blacks was known to be “below” the whites, many years ago. There have been very few times in which a black author places emphasis on race, or puts their race above other ones. The affect/message the author was trying to achieve throughout “Recitatif,” was simply to make the readers understand that after it’s all set and done, race has nothing to do with anything, and should not get in the way of anything. When Twyla and Roberta first came in contact with each other, the color of each girl’s skin had nothing to do with them getting along and being friends. The story of course mentions how they did not like each other at first, but it does not say it was because Twyla and Roberta are different. Toni Morrison writes, “We were eight years old and got F’s all the time. Me because I couldn’t remember what I read or what the teacher said. And Roberta because she couldn’t read at all and didn’t even listen to the teacher” (Morrison 1). She later writes, “We didn’t like each other all that much at first, but nobody else wanted to play with us because we weren’t real orphans with beautiful dead parents in the sky. We were dumped” (Morrison 2). It is evident that race does not and should not get in the way of a friendship.
Also, Toni Morrison also keeps the race of Maggie suspicious to express her view on the race of a woman, and to set a conflict within the story that both Roberta and Twyla always discuss when they see each other. At one point in the story, Roberta exclaimed, “You’re the same little state kid who kicked a 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 (Morrison 13). Following this, Twyla asserted, “She wasn’t black” (Morrison 14). With anger, Roberta said, “Like hell she wasn’t, and you kicked her. We both did. You kicked a black lady who couldn’t even scream” (Morrison 14). The suspicion of the whole “Maggie situation,” is the heart of the story. It confuses the readers, makes them wonder, and is a huge conflict in the story. The story with Maggie is Toni Morrison’s example of race getting in between friendships, which should never happen. “Recitatif,” by Toni Morrison, is by far much more of a different story than most. The way the author keeps the race of the major characters hidden is definitely a tactic used to express Morrison’s point of view on race, and how it does not matter to her. The fact that she keeps the race hidden also sets up the questions of the whole story—what color is Twyla and what is Roberta? And especially, what color is Maggie? And whether she is or is not black, matters depending on the race of Roberta and Twyla.
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Although the story is difficult to grasp at first, it has an affect on readers that makes them change their point of view on race. Morrison does this not through her telling readers to change it, but through examples, big or small, throughout, “Recitatif.” Lastly, Toni Morrison in her story makes readers realize that we do not have to listen to others when it comes to someone who is a different color than us. In the story, Twyla says, “Every now and then she would stop dancing long enough to tell me something important and one of the things she said was that they never washed their hair and they smelled funny. Roberta sure did” (Morrison 1). Twyla does not listen to this racial criticism, and becomes friends with Roberta anyway. Although, “Recitatif,” is a very perplexing story, is holds a great message underneath everything, and has a positive affect on the readers overall.
