Toni Morrison's burning words in 'Love'

There are books that are very difficult to talk about, they cause a lump in the throat, a feeling of emptiness, of abandonment. At first I thought I didn't need, I didn't want to talk about my experience, the first one, reading Toni Morrison. This book "Love" is one of those short books that carry too much inside; too many emotions, traumatic experiences, pain, too many excuses to break us as readers. What theme to choose? the abuse? childhood destroyed? the delusions? the magic? love? Is there really love inside this book?

Morrison, through wonderful, beautiful prose, puts the worst of human beings in front of our faces. It focuses us on a not so distant past in which abuse and racism were a constant, they still are, and that is perhaps what makes this book harder to read and digest, seeing that this horrible world continues to be the same, hasn't changed at all. Our two protagonists are victims of the same man, an older man who seeks his pleasure and happiness at the expense of all the women around him. Throughout the narrative, our two girls become two broken, abused and abandoned women, enemies and sisters.

As I write this I cannot hold back the tears, I suppose that like many books, this one affects you in a different way if you have lived up close or personally in an abuse situation. An 11 year old girl married (sold!) to an old man is just disgusting, disturbing and sadly very real, even today, in many parts of the world. Can we blame her for something? Of course not, but the story shows us how everything she is forced to experience turns her into a woman, sometimes evil, sometimes delusional, sometimes oblivious to reality. Morrison chooses to speak of love through everything that is not love. Rape, pedophilia, simply carnal desire, money, power, politics; everything is woven into her narrative and leaves the reader, at times, in tears of despair.

“It takes a certain intelligence to love like that – softly, without props. But the world is such a showpiece, maybe that’s why folks try to outdo it, put everything they feel onstage just to prove they can think up things too: handsome scary things like fights to the death, adultery, setting sheets afire. They fail of course. The world outdoes them every time.”

Even so, there are moments, beautiful and short, in which Morrison puts what true love may be in the mouth of her characters. A happy marriage, a man who hugs his wife and they dance in the kitchen while she washed the dishes. A grandson who opens up in confidence to his grandfather. Two friends who forgive each other their offenses on the deathbed of one of them. In their memories, love is drawn in childhood, in innocence, in their games when they shared secrets, stories and food, when together they believed they would always be happy. We see this true love at the end of the book, when everything has already been broken, everything has been corrupted and the heart of each character has opened. Maybe life is like that sometimes, maybe we find love only at the end, after learning and crying a lot, after breaking someone's heart. Perhaps among so many conflicting issues that Morrison touches on, the one that generates the most questions for me is precisely defining love. What is it?

In a short but significant talk, the grandfather tells his grandson that sometimes, as a man, you are lucky and find a woman who is wonderful, good, intelligent, who does you good and who can also provide you with satisfying intimacy, sex. It's very interesting how quickly and concisely he generates a scale of priorities in which, yes, sex is important, but if it goes alone, it's useless. Then even more wonderful, he tells him that sometimes a wonderful woman in your life is enough, she shouldn't be your partner, she can be your mother, a sister, a daughter.

“A woman is an important somebody and sometimes you win the triple crown: good food, good sex, and good talk. Most men settle for any one, happy as a clam if they get two. But listen, let me tell you something. A good man is a good thing, but there is nothing in the world better than a good good woman. She can be your mother, your wife, your girlfriend, your sister, or somebody you work next to. Don’t matter. You find one, stay there. You see a scary one, make tracks.”

The important thing is that there is love, that she is your friend, that she is there for you. How beautiful is this. Why do we tend to think of soulmates only as couples? In my opinion we find them in anyone, perhaps in that friend who always accompanies you unconditionally, perhaps in a child who fills you with the desire to live again, perhaps in a mother, the eternal love of our lives.

Morrison generates more questions than answers throughout the book, she creates personal doubts, doubts about the narrative, about her characters, about her as the author and the woman behind every word. As humans we are left naked, defenseless.

Her work was new to me, even so, it is sometimes so intimate that it is known. I say this full of sadness, because feeling known in a narrative of violence, alcohol, abuse... is not exactly encouraging, but it makes it more real and more powerful. The history of struggle and resistance is evident, it is woven with poetry, with magic. Morrison's words are completely beautiful and direct, it is a dialogue with something magical, with a constant struggle.

The story of the black women, the story of resistance and the love of sisters are perhaps the most powerful and primordial elements, they are what make her words so burning.

'Love' is a book that forces us to break with what we think we know about human relationships, about friendship, love, sex or family. Morrison forces us to see ourselves more human and feel in a more real way.

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