Song of Solomon and the Motif of Flight - Literature review Example

Flying Over the Heavens: Song of Solomon and the Motif of Flight [ID The ancients always looked at the heavens and assumed that the landof flight, air, sun and the stars was the celestial realm, where the gods were. Whether it was Zeus as god of lightning, Thor as god of thunder, Bright Sun in Native American mythology, or Lucifer the Morningstar, the skies must have been the realm of the heavens. Song of Solomon, even beyond its title, uses Biblical and religious imagery. One of the most important recurring images is the idea of flight. The metaphor of flight has three levels in Song of Solomon: The most literal level, where it represents flight and retreat; a less literal level, where this flight and retreat is also a withdrawal and abandoning of others; and a final culmination, where freedom does not mean antisociality. Flight is found in the myths of the Hebrew people, from which the original Song of Solomon came from. Unsurprisingly for a people who endured multiple exoduses, the myths of the tzaddikim include the references to flying, the stars and freedom: “Once we know that the stars and their planets were created as an abode for the tzaddikim, we might naturally wonder how they will be transported to them. However, the Talmud even provides an answer to this question. Discussing the passage (Isaiah 40:31), They shall mount up with wings as eagles, the Talmud states that in the future world, God will grant the tzaddikim wings to escape the earth. The Zohar goes a step further and states that God will give them wings to fly through the entire universe” (Kaplan). This myth tells us many things that illustrative for understanding Song of Solomon itself: Flight is often a retreat; this retreat can be antisocial and cowardly, or a gift from God; and flight is not just a way to get away, but to get to. The word “flight” itself appears six times throughout the book, while other forms and references appear more. It appears from beginning to end, and thus is clearly a recurring motif. The first mention of the word appears in Morrisons foreword, in which she herself discusses the importance of the concept: “A journey, then, with the accomplishment of flight... All very saga-like. Old-school heroic, but with other meanings. Opening the novel with the suicidal leap of the insurance agent, ending it with the protagonists confrontational soar into danger, was meant to enclose the mystical but problematic one taken by the Solomon of the title” (Morrison, 1977). This was connected to her own attempt to get over male-dominated literature: The idea that flight could be connected to femininity. This understanding undergirds one of the most important sentences of the novel, “The North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance agent promised to fly from Mercy to the other side of Lake Superior at 3:00” (Morrison, 1977). Flying “from” mercy across the lake is a statement tinged with significance: Leaving the town of Mercy, which is far from merciful. But is the agent being selfish? Superficially, yes; he is jumping to ease his own pain, while telling his family hypocritically that he loves them. But symbolically, it is not. He is jumping to lead the way, to hope that others fly too. Flight is magical but it is also mundane. Milkman flies to the Pittsburgh airport. But this mundane flight is limited, just like all the other mundane options. Milkman wants to get to Danville but cant by flight; instead, he has to go on the Greyhound bus, not feeling the “elegance” the same way he did on the flight. Flight is established as a temporary respite, a luxury that the people of Michigan normally cant access. The way that flight is described in the book is itself a glimpse into the psyche of the African-American denizens of Michigan. “Milkman... slept the night in her perfect arms. It was a warm dreamy sleep all about flying... But not about arms stretched out like airplane wings, nor shot forward like Superman in a horizontal dive, but floating, cruising, in the relaxed position of a man lying on a couch reading the newspaper. Part of his flight was over the dark sea, but it didnt frighten him because he knew he could not fall...” (Morrison, 1977). The airplane and the Superman flight implies power, dominance, control, mastery over the wind, sky, air and stars. It is the dream of those who are already powerful and can imagine only more. But Milkman has never felt powerful, being at the bottom of the racial caste structure. He wants to be free, not to control other people or things. So his flight is leisurely, almost comical. It is only about the liberation, not about anything else. It is also about rest and respite. Like “a man lying on a couch”, Milkmans imagined flight is about being free from earthly constraints, liberated from stress and worry, able to go where he pleases, or nowhere at all. Flight is also a connection to a lost African heritage, shamanic and tribal, powerful and potent yet lost, the same way that Not Doctor Street and Not Mercy is a linguistic exercise of rebellion. “He could fly? You hear me? My great-granddaddy could fly! Goddamn!” The idea that some great ancestor in the past could escape the tradition of pain would lead future generations. This idea, of flight as a gift passed down through a line of descent, establishes why the selfish idea of flight is superficial. Any individual persons flight might be a selfish retreat from a demanding family, from work, from the community, leaving them stranded. It might have selfish motivations or outcomes. But these flights, no matter their individual circumstances, inspire a community. The suicide of the insurance agent, reeling from redlining and discrimination, struggling under hard economic times, inspired a community. Flight does have its consequences, though. “You just cant fly on off and leave a body... A human life is precious”. Leaving someone you have some connection to, whether because you killed them or because you married them, is wrong. It has consequences. It may free your body but it imprisons your soul. Flight thus functions as a thread to trace through the competing ideas of freedom in the novel. Should poor people seek to just retreat from poverty and fear and stress by retreating into themselves or into drugs? Thats one form of retreat. What about retreating by making money and leaving the community, proving that you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps but also saying that everyone else you left behind was incapable of doing so? What about leading a community in a new way? The suicide of the insurance agent and Milkmans flight are both confusing and inexplicable, because we cant understand what freedom means to people whove never had it. There is disagreement among the characters as to what flight means. The man who tells Milkman that one cant just fly from a body is one who came back and grabbed human bones. He felt that he had made the person “his” by killing them. But Milman thought this was “fuck[ed” up. A fly is not only a verb, but a noun; a creature as well as an action. Milkman recounts Empire States and Hagars past. Empire State was “[h]appy as a fly and just as industrious”. Flight is power and industry, and this metaphor makes this clear. But Empire State learns that his wife did not love him in particular but black men in general. They were like flies to her: Almost identical, or at least different in a way she did not perceive. Again, flight and its metaphors are connected to Morrisons social criticism. Milkman discovers the truth of flight, his dreams, the connections to the past, all building up to the last lesson, the same lesson the boy learns in The Alchemist: "[I]f you surrendered to the air, you could ride it”. The idea of flight that everyone has in the novel, the reason the agent fails even with his understanding, is the idea of dominating the air, of moving above God. But that just makes one into a dominator, a tyrant who makes others want to fly away too. Someone who does this is running from something, running from responsibilities. Milkman learns to become one with the air, one with God, to surrender, to give up the freedom he never had in order to reclaim it. This is not dominance, this is unity, sharing. Flight throughout Song of Solomon makes the connection from African tribal magic and Hebrew tradition, God and Africa, to modern America. It connects ideas of liberty, abandonment, exodus, retreat, and nationality. Exploring the contradictions of flight becomes the whole novel. The insurance agent led the way. His imperfection and selfishness let Milkman learn a truth deeper than either of them could imagine. God, or magic, or the world, or whatever it is, would give someone who had found pure motives and humility a way to lead the community. The song of Solomon, then, is the song of the exodus of the people of Michigan, not from Michigan but from poverty of body, spirit and wallet. Works Cited Kaplan, Aryeh. “Extraterrestrial life”. Torah.org. http://www.torah.org/features/secondlook/extraterrestrial.html# Morrison, Toni. Song of Solomon. 1977. Random House. Read More

But is the agent being selfish? Superficially, yes; he is jumping to ease his own pain, while telling his family hypocritically that he loves them. But symbolically, it is not. He is jumping to lead the way, to hope that others fly too. Flight is magical but it is also mundane. Milkman flies to the Pittsburgh airport. But this mundane flight is limited, just like all the other mundane options. Milkman wants to get to Danville but cant by flight; instead, he has to go on the Greyhound bus, not feeling the “elegance” the same way he did on the flight.

Flight is established as a temporary respite, a luxury that the people of Michigan normally cant access. The way that flight is described in the book is itself a glimpse into the psyche of the African-American denizens of Michigan. “Milkman. slept the night in her perfect arms. It was a warm dreamy sleep all about flying. But not about arms stretched out like airplane wings, nor shot forward like Superman in a horizontal dive, but floating, cruising, in the relaxed position of a man lying on a couch reading the newspaper.

Part of his flight was over the dark sea, but it didnt frighten him because he knew he could not fall.” (Morrison, 1977). The airplane and the Superman flight implies power, dominance, control, mastery over the wind, sky, air and stars. It is the dream of those who are already powerful and can imagine only more. But Milkman has never felt powerful, being at the bottom of the racial caste structure. He wants to be free, not to control other people or things. So his flight is leisurely, almost comical.

It is only about the liberation, not about anything else. It is also about rest and respite. Like “a man lying on a couch”, Milkmans imagined flight is about being free from earthly constraints, liberated from stress and worry, able to go where he pleases, or nowhere at all. Flight is also a connection to a lost African heritage, shamanic and tribal, powerful and potent yet lost, the same way that Not Doctor Street and Not Mercy is a linguistic exercise of rebellion. “He could fly? You hear me?

My great-granddaddy could fly! Goddamn!” The idea that some great ancestor in the past could escape the tradition of pain would lead future generations. This idea, of flight as a gift passed down through a line of descent, establishes why the selfish idea of flight is superficial. Any individual persons flight might be a selfish retreat from a demanding family, from work, from the community, leaving them stranded. It might have selfish motivations or outcomes. But these flights, no matter their individual circumstances, inspire a community.

The suicide of the insurance agent, reeling from redlining and discrimination, struggling under hard economic times, inspired a community. Flight does have its consequences, though. “You just cant fly on off and leave a body. A human life is precious”. Leaving someone you have some connection to, whether because you killed them or because you married them, is wrong. It has consequences. It may free your body but it imprisons your soul. Flight thus functions as a thread to trace through the competing ideas of freedom in the novel.

Should poor people seek to just retreat from poverty and fear and stress by retreating into themselves or into drugs? Thats one form of retreat. What about retreating by making money and leaving the community, proving that you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps but also saying that everyone else you left behind was incapable of doing so? What about leading a community in a new way? The suicide of the insurance agent and Milkmans flight are both confusing and inexplicable, because we cant understand what freedom means to people whove never had it.

There is disagreement among the characters as to what flight means. The man who tells Milkman that one cant just fly from a body is one who came back and grabbed human bones. He felt that he had made the person “his” by killing them.

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