Recitatif Essay

This Study Guide consists of approximately 53 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of Recitatif.

Recitatif Essay

This Study Guide consists of approximately 53 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of Recitatif.
This section contains 4,007 words
(approx. 11 pages at 400 words per page)
Buy the Recitatif Study Guide

In the following essay, Goldstein-Shirley explores the ambiguity of the two protagonists' races in "Recitatif," saying it necessitates a closer and more careful reading of the story for the reader.

Like all of her fiction, the only short story ever published by Nobel laureate Toni Morrison challenges its readers. From its outset, "Recitatif" keeps its readers off-balance. Its plot enigmas, language tricks, and story line gaps disturb readers, prodding them out of lazy reading and complacency and into fuller, deeper engagement with the text. These unusual textual elements push readers to solve the mysteries, fill in the gaps, and thereby complete the story. By participating in making meaning out of the text, readers experience the story on a more visceral level than they otherwise would. Furthermore, they respond on a meta-analytical level, encouraged to consider why the text's elements influenced their responses in particular ways. By using...

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This section contains 4,007 words
(approx. 11 pages at 400 words per page)
Buy the Recitatif Study Guide
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Gale
Recitatif from Gale. ©2005-2006 Thomson Gale, a part of the Thomson Corporation. All rights reserved.