Song of Solomon quotes

Question 1

Guitar’s speech about black masculinity

II. 10. 222

Answer 1

‘Everybody wants the life of a black man.’
‘They want us, you know, ‘universal,’ human, no ‘race consciousness.’ Tame, except in bed. They like a little racial loincloth in the bed.
‘Oh they love the music, but only after you pull eight at the post office.’
‘They (black women) won’t even let you risk your own life, man, your own life–unless its over them…What good is a man’s life if he can’t even choose what to die for?’

Question 2

Guitar’s Love

II. 10. 223

Answer 2

“It is about love. What else but love? Can’t I love what I criticise?”

Question 3

Guitar’s father

II. 10. 224

Answer 3

Sliced in two and placed ‘cut side down’. Each half facing the other.

Question 4

Circe’s house

II. 10. 220

Answer 4

‘Life that crawled, life that slunk and crept and never closed its eyes…Birth, life, and death–each took place on the hidden side of a leaf. From where he stood, the house looked as if it had been eaten by a galloping disease, the sores of which were dark and fluid.

Question 5

Awakening of orality

II. 10. 220

Answer 5

‘raucous silence’

Question 6

Flying

II. 10. 220

Answer 6

‘The airplance ride exhilarated him, encouraged illusion and a feeling of invulnerability.’

Question 7

Milkman’s possessions, what do they represent?

II. 10

Answer 7

‘Cutty Sark’ ‘the gold Longines’ p226 - notes everything by brand, ownership ‘his beigh three-piece suit’, ‘and his beautiful Florsheim shoes ‘ p227

Question 8

the watch

Answer 8

‘gold Longines’ (226), ‘heavy overdesigned watch’ (238), it breaks in the water (250)

Question 9

Street names

Answer 9

‘How could he find Windsor or Stone Lane if there were no signs?’ (II. 10. 228)

Question 10

The Men’s interpretation of Macon Dead Sr

II. 10. 235

Answer 10

‘Grab it. Grab this land! Take it, hold it, my brothers, make it, my brothers, shake it, squeeze it, dig it, plow it, seed it, reap it, rent it, buy it, sell it, own it, build it, multiply it, and pass it on - can you hear me? Pass it on!”

Question 11

Circe’s Knocker

II. 10. 238

Answer 11

‘the sound was soaked up like a single raindrop in cotton’

Question 12

Circe

II. 10.

Answer 12

Old woman w/ voice of a twenty year old, ‘combination of daintiness and cultivated speech’ p248

Question 13

Circe’s criticism of Milkman

II. 10.

Answer 13

• “You don’t listen to people. Your ear is on your head, but its not connected to your brain. “p247

Question 14

Milkman’s hunger

II. 10.

Answer 14

• ‘Milkman began to shake with hunger. Real hunger, not the less than top-full feeling he was accustomed to, the nervous desire to taste something good. Real hunger.’ p253
• He examined the bushes, the branches, the ground for a berry, a nut, anything. But he didn’t know what to look for nor how they grew.’ p253

Question 15

Solomon and Shalimar

II. 11

Answer 15

• “Yes, suh. Shalimar.” The man pronounced it Shalleemone.’ p261

Question 16

Milkman’s first meeting w/ Guitar
II. 11
(memory)

Answer 16

‘Milkman watched the children. He’d never played like that as a child.’ p264
‘until Guitar pulled those four boys off him’ p264 -

Question 17

Presentation of Milkman by the Shalimar men

II. 11

Answer 17

• ‘He was telling them that they weren’t men, and that they relied on women and children for their food.’ p266
  
  • ‘They looked at his skin and saw it as black as theirs, but they knew he had the heart of the white men who came to pick them up in the trucks when they needed anonymous, faceless labourers.’ p266

Question 18

Anger

I. 6

Answer 18

M: “You’re not angry? You must be!”
G: “Not at all…”

Question 19

Guitar’s feelings towards Macon Sr

II. 1

Answer 19

‘Your father is a very strange negro…He behaves like a white man, thinks like a white man.’

Question 20

Shalimone’s attitude to Milkman

II. 11

Answer 20

‘They looked at his skin and saw it as black as theirs, but they knew he had the heart of the white men who came to pick them up in the trucks when they needed anonymous faceless labourers.’ (266)

Question 21

Beer

I. 4. 91

Answer 21

‘She was the third beer. Not the first one, which the throat receives with almost tearful gratitude; not the second, that confirms and extends the pleasure of the first. But the third, the one you drink because its there, because it can’t hurt, and because what difference does it make?’

Question 22

Milkman’s unawareness of his past

Answer 22

“Your father was a slave?”

“What kind of foolish question is that? Course he was. Who hadn’t been in 1869?” p33

Question 23

Names - Macon Sr’s Mama

Answer 23

“Mama liked it. Liked the name.. Said it was new and wold wipe out the past. Wipe it all out.” p54

Question 24

What does Milkman want?

Answer 24

‘He just wanted to beat a path away from his parents’ past, which was also their present and threatening to become his as well.’ p180

Question 25

Guitar’s name

Answer 25

“Guitar is my name. Baines is the slave-master’s name. And I’m all of that. Slave names don’t bother me but slave status does.”

II. 6. 160

Question 26

Milkman’s orality

Answer 26

Solomon and Ryna - Solomon’s Leap and Ryna’s Gulch.
Sing Byrd>Sing Bird>’No–Singing Bird!’ p304
Listening and oral exchange.