Paradise

“The embezzler’s joy that could be demolished was, particularly in the dining room, which the nuns converted to a schoolroom, where stilled Arapaho girls once sat and learned to forget.”

Morrison is careful not to erase the presence of Indigenous people or the continued epistemological violence and dispossession of land they experienced as other people continued settling the West. Historically, Catholic schools played a significant role in erasing Indigenous cultures. The Arapaho girls “learned to forget” their religious practices, languages, traditional clothing, and many more elements of their culture.

“The women had no firm opinion until the nephew’s mother died. Her funeral—the town’s first—stopped the schedule of discussion and its necessity. They named the town after one of their own and the men did not gainsay them. All right. Well. Ruby. Young Ruby.”

When Ruby Morgan dies, the newly founded town is named after her. For the town, Ruby embodies the importance of rejecting outsiders, as her death results from the rejection that the townspeople faced. Also, in a town where the men hold all the authority, it is meaningful that the women have the final say in naming the town.

“She is my mother. Your mother too. Whose mother you?”

Here, Connie is speaking to Mavis and referring to Mother Superior. This quote illustrates how Connie and Mother Superior are the beginning of the “found family” that develops at the Convent. Their love for each other transcends biological relation. This points back to nuns, often referred to as “mother” and able to fill the role of parental guardian for anyone without relation. 

“All three watched the brown fingers gentling the white ones.”

Here, Connie massages Mother Superior’s hands, now caring for the woman who once cared for her. The narrative reminds us, here, that Mother Superior is white. This kind of interracial affection between the two women stands in contrast to the intolerance in Ruby, where white folks are not welcome. The relationship between Mother Superior and Connie and the unquestioning acceptance of the unspecified “white girl” shows the Convent to be a safe space for all who come. 

“Since the loose bones of his cousins had been buried two years ago, K.D., their hope and their despair, was the last male in a line that included a lieutenant governor, a state auditor and two mayors.” 

Following the death of Scout and Easter Morgan, K.D. has big shoes to fill as the only heir of the Morgans. This poses a conflict for his uncles Deek and Steward because K.D. is obviously irresponsible. His carelessness around getting Arnette pregnant and the unseemly relationship he begins with Gigi soon after are serious causes for concern. Over the course of the novel, K.D. must align with the traditional values and expectations. We see the signs of this in his eventual marriage to Arnette, their second baby (born now in wedlock), and their new house.

“The men sat on spotless upholstery waiting for Reverend Misner to finish seeing the women who were nowhere in sight.” 

As the Fleetwood men host a meeting with the Morgans to resolve the offense of K.D. getting Arnette pregnant and slapping her publicly, the Fleetwood women are always fluttering around in the background but not seen. On page 60, the men hear “the light click of heels: the women pacing, servicing, fetching feeding”; on the next page, all there is of them are “tippy-tap steps of women nowhere in sight.” This scene presents an image of the traditional domestic role that the men of Ruby expect the women to fill. They are useful, busy, and “servicing,” but they do not speak in the meetings, or even appear to be seen.

“Royal Beauchamp actually interrupted him, the Reverend! ‘What is talk if it’s not ‘back’? You all just don’t want us to talk at all. Any talk is ‘backtalk’ if you don’t agree with what’s being said….Sir.’”

This scene stages the growing conflict between Ruby’s older and younger generations. The youth are beginning to question the expectations and values of the elders in Ruby, and it is causing division. As the older generations of Ruby search for somewhere to place blame, the Convent becomes a scapegoat for this division. With the final attack, the Convent women are made to pay the price for problems that the people of Ruby fail to deal with themselves.

“From then on, the journey was purposeful, free of the slightest complaints. Every now and then the walking man reappeared: along a riverbed, at the crest of a hill, leaning against a rock formation.”

This is just one of several moments in the text where Morrison employs a literary technique comparable to “magic realism,” made popular by authors like Gabriel García Mérquez in Latin American literature. This mysterious disappearing man leads the way for 8-rock families to Haven. He evokes the mystical way God led the Israelites on their journey to Canaan, using a pillar of clouds by day and a pillar of fire by night (see the biblical book of Exodus).

“Because the old way was slow, limited to just a few, and weak. This last accusation swole Deek’s neck and, on a weekday, had him blowing out the brains of quail to keep his own from exploding.”

Deek is very serious about maintaining the “old way” and the legacy of Haven and Ruby. The intergenerational conflict dividing the town is particularly disturbing to him as a Morgan, one of the New Fathers, and the grandson of Zechariah “Coffee” Morgan, an Old Father. So committed to the old way, Deek is willing to do anything to preserve it. As he shoots the quail, “blowing out the brains,” it foreshadows the climax when he shoots Connie in the head.

“The four side streets east of Central were named after the Gospels. When a fifth street was needed it was named St. Peter.”

The main streets in Ruby share the same names as several books of the biblical New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John (known as “the Gospels”), as well as Peter. This reflects the Christianity that the residents of Ruby hold so dear. Religion features centrally in the novel. For example, there are three different congregations in town—the Baptists, the Methodists, and the Pentecostals; the Convent was previously a Catholic school but now hosts new spiritual experiences for the women there; there is an ideological disagreement between Reverend Pulliam and Reverend Misner. Ultimately, the streets named after Jesus’s disciples are symbols of how religion is the central organizing principle for the people of Ruby.

“They didn’t like each other at all, so Seneca had equalized her smiles and agreeableness. If one cursed and joked nastily about the other, Seneca laughed. When the other rolled her eyes in disgust, Seneca shot her an understanding look. Always the peacemaker. The one who said yes or I don’t mind or I’ll go. Otherwise—what? They might not like her. Might cry. Might leave.” 

This scene offers insight into who Seneca is—a people pleaser, agreeable to a fault. This same quality leads her to agree to the job with the mysterious woman in the limo who keeps her as a sexual pet. This agreeableness is likely a survival tactic developed during her childhood in foster care and exposure to abuse. Further, she is also agreeable because she fears that, otherwise, they “might leave.” This points back to her history of abandonment, where her mother, Jean (whom she thought was her sister), left her at the age of five. Afraid of abandonment, Seneca can only heal when she finds a home at the Convent with women who could all be somewhere else but choose to stay. There, Seneca can say “yes” to herself.

“Love is divine only and difficult always. If you think it is easy you are a fool. If you think it is natural you are blind. It is a learned application without reason or motive except that it is God.”

When Reverend Senior Pulliam gives his remarks at Arnette and K.D.’s wedding, he describes love as a solemn undertaking. His words come as a criticism of Arnette and K.D., who have shown themselves to be irresponsible and who are marrying not for love but for the union of their families, the Morgans and the Fleetwoods. Pulliam’s sermon could also be read as a lesson for all the people of Ruby. They have put so much energy into hate—hating outsiders and hating each other—that they have forgotten that love also requires effort. Were they to work at love the way they work at hate, they may have been able to withstand the internal division.

“He looked up at the cross Reverend Misner was holding holding holding. Saying nothing, just holding it there in locked time while the unendurable silence was sprinkled with coughs and soft, encouraging grunts.”

Disturbed by Pulliam’s scathing sermon at K.D. and Arnette’s wedding, Reverend Misner begins his remarks by silently holding up a cross before the congregation. The moment is long and uncomfortable, angering some of the attendees. Morrison’s writing style illustrates the lasting moment as she repeats, “holding holding holding.” This is characteristic of one of Morrison’s literary strategies, where the words and the narrative join to convey the same idea.

“The Convent girls are dancing; throwing their arms over their heads, they do this and that and then the other.”

This scene, where the Convent women dance at the wedding, is brief but significant. The townspeople view it as a serious offense because the women’s behavior is vulgar. Ultimately, they are forced to leave the reception. In the novel, Morrison switches to present tense when she writes this scene. This is not unlike the opening scene and the climax in chapter 8, which are also written in the present tense. This tense shift creates a sense of immediacy where the reader is invited into the temporality of the story to experience the characters’ “now.” This choice also signals to the reader that the wedding scene is not just an event but an incident.

“But Fairy DuPres cursed him, saying, ‘God don’t love ugly ways. Watch out He don’t deny you what you love too.’ A remark Dovey must have thought about a lot until 1964, when the curse was completed.”

Fairy DuPres condemns Steward Morgan when he criticizes Menus for marrying a light-skinned woman. The “curse” in 1964 refers to when Steward and Dovey learn that they cannot have children. This curse appears to be divine punishment for Steward’s unrelenting hatefulness toward outsiders. Carrying so much hate within himself, the only thing Steward could love is his own family. The curse only causes him to be more hateful, priming him to eventually murder Connie and preemptively punishing him for that unspeakable crime.

“There is honey in this land sweeter than any I know of, and I have cut cane in places where the dirt itself tasted like sugar, so that’s saying a heap.”

Nathan DuPres addresses the crowd before the nativity play and talks about the pain and joy he has experienced in Ruby. When he says, “There is honey in this land,” he evokes the description of the biblical Promised Land for the ancient Israelites as a land of “milk and honey.” In this analogy, Ruby is framed as a paradise promised to the people by God. Nathan’s speech is in keeping with the play that also draws connections between the bible and the townspeople in its depiction of journeying families.

“But can’t you even imagine what it must feel like to have a true home? I don’t mean heaven. I mean a real earthly home. Not some fortress you bought and built up and have to keep everybody locked in or out. A real home.”

Reverend Misner stands at the back of the audience of the Christmas play talking to Pat Best. Misner and Pat are both outsiders—Misner has recently moved to town, and Pat has the stain of being light-skinned in a dark-skinned town, the product of a coupling the leaders disapproved of. Both Misner and Pat try to make sense of the townspeople’s desperate clamoring for this exclusive and hard-won home. As an outsider, Misner can more easily question the “paradise” that the people have constructed. He makes a meaningful commentary on what constitutes home. For him, it is not a place you settle but a place where you inherently belong and have always belonged.

“Lone called it ‘stepping in.’ Consolata said it was ‘seeing in.’ Thus the gift was ‘in sight.’ Something God made free to anyone who wanted to develop it. It was devious but it settled the argument between herself and Lone and made it possible for her to accept Lone’s remedies for all sorts of ills and to experiment with others while the ‘in sight’ blazed away. The dimmer the visible world, the more dazzling her ‘in sight’ became.”

Connie’s spiritual gift of “in sight” allows her to see inside a person and prolong their life through some unexplained power. Having been raised Catholic, Connie fears that this power is ungodly, but Lone sees it as being in harmony with God. It reflects how the Convent is both a monument to Catholicism and the site of some other spiritual transformation. Connie’s gift of “in sight” also parallels her general gift for ordinary insight, an intuitive ability to understand things deeply. She shares this insight with the Convent women when she teaches them to “loud dream.”

“Hear me, listen. Never break them in two. Never put one over the other. Eve is Mary’s mother. Mary is the daughter of Eve.”

As Connie insists that “Eve is Mary’s mother,” she complicates the Catholic elevation of Mary, the Mother of Christ, as holy and a mother to all. Connie reminds them that Eve—the biblical first woman—is also the mother to all. In this way, Mary and Eve become mothers to each other. Likewise, Mother Superior, as a nun, served as a mother to all who came under her care; still, as her health failed, Connie stepped into a role as a kind of mother to Mother Superior (through caring for her and sustaining her life), and eventually as a mother to all the women at the Convent.

“Then she might realize what was missing: unlike some people in Ruby, the Convent women were no longer haunted. Or hunted either, she might have added. But there she would have been wrong.”

Once the Convent women submit to Connie’s therapeutic practices of loud dreaming and painting inside their silhouettes on the floor, they become more confident and find healing. They are “no longer haunted” by the trauma of their pasts. Instead, when they appear to people from their lives before the Convent at the end of the novel, they seem to be doing the haunting. However, they are opportunities for closure on the women’s own terms.

“Not women locked safely away from men; but worse, women who chose themselves for company, which is to say not a convent but a coven.”

The men of Ruby cannot make sense of women who do not need men but choose to stay among themselves. Unable to comprehend this disruption of gender roles, they conclude that the women are evil. On the same page, they call the women “witches” and say, “They don’t need men and they don’t need God.” Previously a house of God, the Convent is recast as a house of the devil. This is integral to the ease with which these supposedly Christian men decide to kill the Convent women. One might describe the raid as a witch hunt, evocative of the Salem witch trials.

“Bunched at the windows, all five understand: the women are not hiding. They are loose.” 

The “five” here are five of the nine men from Ruby who come to attack the Convent. This scene in the climax is pivotal, as the Convent women have taken the offensive position rather than simply defensive. In this showdown between Ruby and the Convent, the men learn that they are not as powerful as they think. Further, the women demonstrate that they are now strong, having come a long way from their past of weakness and helplessness.

“The most interesting development was with the Morgan brothers. Their distinguishing features were eroding: tobacco choices (they gave up cigar and chaw at the same time), shoes, clothes, facial hair. Pat thought they looked more alike than they probably had at birth. But the inside difference was too deep for anyone to miss.”

As Deek and Steward become ideologically different, they grow more similar in appearance. After Steward kills Connie, Deek chooses to “lose [his] brother” (303). The growing similarity and difference is an example of dramatic irony. Morrison uses this irony to illustrate the significant character development of Deek, who has let go of all the convictions that Steward still holds onto.