The Toni Morrison Dreams

Describe symbolism in The Toni Morrison Dreams by Elizabeth Alexander

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In Section Three, Morrison evaluates the speaker's work. The speaker says Morrison "does not love / [her] work." A subjective evaluation like this one completely without qualification, explanation, or guidance is likely to fall on the speaker as a flat rejection of her work. The goal of the aspiring writer is not to please one important reader but rather to find what is inside herself and nurture that. She may be able to learn from role models, but ultimately she searches for her own voice and her own worldview. The valued inner part may be symbolized by the baby the speaker has with her that Morrison loves. Morrison "tells [her] / to have many more." If interpreted literally, this passage seems to say that the speaker is a young mother who brings her baby to this program. That she goes to the conference or into a writing workshop with her baby suggests that she is encumbered in more ways than one. She is pursuing two roles, as writer and as mother.

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The Toni Morrison Dreams