The Conflict between Nature Versus Civilizati...

The Conflict between Nature Versus Civilization In Toni Morrison's "Tar Baby"

Author Name : Prof. Sanjay Kumar Swarnkar, Shalini Shukla

ABSTRACT

We are identified by our roots and origin in society. In the life of every person his religion, his beliefs, his morals, his way of living and his family have an important role. One's place of birth and its environment plays an important role in building the character of the person. These ideas have been discussed in the present research paper, here the contradiction between nature and civilization, which has been going on since time immemorial, is discussed.  In the novel, Tar Baby Morrison talks about the capitalist social system and racist Afro American class community differences. We have discussed how the capitalist economic system and racism ruined people's lives through its exploitative process just to expand its vast empire. We have discussed the evil that divides people in the name of class, community and race. The society was divided into different parts. Racism, sexism and class division which are the important product of capitalism hegemonized the Afro American society.  In the novel Tar Baby, 1981 through the love story of Jadine and Son Morrison has portrayed the development of two different cultural backgrounds in society. Throwing light on the matter Eleanor Traylor comments that : "It is a story of a man in search of nourishment and of a woman whose nourishing power, cut off from the story of a world where pretentious wars with authenticity and where people who live in the world must choose, for there are guides. And those guides throughout the fabulous fiction of Toni Morrison, are legion. They are, for instance, women who, like those of whom Tar Baby is dedicated, are representative of culture of a time, of a magnificence perpetually preserved in human history."  (149)

Keywords: Nature, Civilization, Community, Values, Selfhood, Freedom, Racism, Magnificence