2 Contemporary Literature, 1970 to Present
For example, in Morrison’s first novel, The Bluest Eye (1970), such issues as
the “color aesthetic” (the valuing by blacks, at some points in African American
history, of light skin over dark), the beauty myth, poverty, and abuse are drama-
tized through main characters, who are children. Morrison’s second novel, Sula
(1973), portrays the friendship of two African American women growing up in
the 1920s and 1930s. Her National Book Critics Circle Award–winning Song of
Solomon (1977) has a male protagonist, but female experiences and perspectives
play a significant role in the story.
Morrison’s novel Beloved (1987) is the subject of a Study Guide on Works
and Writers in this volume, as is Walker’s The Color Purple (1982), another land-
mark work. Sterling Lecater Bland Jr. notes that Walker’s later works maintain a
focus on black women “in environments characterized by oppression, desperation,
and transcendent faith,” while they “illuminate human experience beyond limits
traditionally defined by class and race.”
Marshall, who was born of Barbadian parents and raised in a mixed West
Indian-African American community in New York City, did not receive criti-
cal attention for her first novel, Brown Girl, Brownstones (1959), which explores
American gender and racial stereotypes against the background of materialist
culture, until it was republished by the Feminist Press in 1981. Marshall was
among the first writers to focus on the subjectivity of the ethnic immigrant;
Praisesong for the Widow (1983), her most popular novel, takes up the return motif
as the middle-aged African American protagonist, Avey Johnson, journeys to the
Caribbean and reclaims her national and personal identity. Marshall’s narratives
emphasize the centrality of women’s voices and provide important evidence of the
interconnectedness of African, Caribbean, and African American cultures.
Naylor’s The Women of Brewster Place (1982) focuses on class issues and
female bonding, while her Mama Day (1988) highlights family history, magic, and
folklore in a love story. Bambara’s short-story collection Gorilla, My Love (1972)
celebrates African American culture and community. One of the most frequently
anthologized stories in the collection, “The Lesson,” presents language and lit-
eracy as central themes, using ethnic dialect to clear a space for alternative voices,
as well as providing social commentary. Students interested in spirituality, pow-
erful ancestor figures, and the relationship between individual and community
fragmentation will also want to explore Bambara’s The Salt Eaters (1980). Other
important fiction by African American women from the 1970s and 1980s cen-
tering on the black female experience include Williams’s Dessa Rose (1986) and
Jones’s Corregidora (1975). While some have criticized these works for displacing
strictly racial paradigms in favor of a focus on communal issues and on romantic
and familial relations, as well as for their sometimes strong critiques of black
men, others argue that putting community and family at center stage “normalizes”
minority life for an often racially prejudiced reading public and, thus, ultimately
serves to overcome racial and ethnic stereotypes.
Important African American voices who emerged in the first two decades of
the contemporary period were not, of course, limited to female writers. In addi-
tion to his novels, poetry, and essays, which are consistently satiric and parodic,
Ishmael Reed has compiled the important anthologies From Totems to Hip-Hop: