Recitatif

by Toni Morrison

This extraordinary story you hold in your hands was specifically intended as “an experiment in the removal of all racial codes from a narrative about two characters of different races for whom racial identity is crucial.”

Morrison wants us ashamed of how we treat the powerless, even if we, too, feel powerless. And one of the ethical complexities of “Recitatif” is the uncomfortable fact that even as Twyla and Roberta fight to assert their own identities—the fact they are both “somebody”—they simultaneously cast others into the role of nobodies.