Despite the continuous discussion
of death, addiction, and crime, nurturing and care play a huge role in understanding
and interpreting the characters in Jesmyn Ward’s Sing, Unburied, Sing.
Throughout the book Ward details tragedies such as the murder of Given, Leonie
and Michael’s addiction to crack, Pop and Richie’s time at Parchman, and the suffering
and death of Mam. While all these tragedies highlight mostly the inequality at
the time of the story, the racism and classism in the deep South, they also
deeply contrast the instances of nurturing and care. Many characters show nurturing
and care: Pop’s role as a parent to Jojo and Kayla and Mam’s words of wisdom
and healing practices. However, the character who shows the most care and
nurturing towards others is Jojo. Jojo is barely a teenager and yet champions
the care of his little sister Kayla. While he takes on many jobs that a big
brother is normally tasked with, such as holding her when she cries and playing
with her when she is bored, he also takes on many roles that are not expected
by a child. For example, Leonie and Michael are abusive parents. Leonie often
discusses her want to hit her children, and most of the time she does cause
them physical harm. In this instance, Michael has just come home from Parchman
and is attempting to cook breakfast for Jojo and Kayla. The book reads, “And
then he’s hunching over both of us, and his arm whips out, whips in, and he’s
dropped the fork and he’s smacking Kayla hard on the thigh, one and twice, his
face as pale and tight as a knot” (228). Kayla, being a toddler, had refused to
get off the kitchen floor to eat the bacon Michael had cooked for her. Because
of this, Michael beats her with the hot fork he used to take the bacon out of
the pan. She begins to wail, and Jojo scoops her up and runs her out the back door
to calm her down. Jojo seems to be one of, if not the only, characters that is always
able to calm Kayla down. It is apparent that Kayla is the most trusting and safe
around Jojo, her thirteen-year-old brother, then with her parents. This one
example expertly highlights the burden Jojo must carry as a young boy who lives
in an abusive household with parents who are more concerned with each other and
crack to correctly care for their children. It is an interesting contrast
between Jojo being the most nurturing character in the book and Leonie being
the least nurturing. Usually, a mother cares deeply for her children and wants
the best for them, willing to sacrifice anything for them. However, this book
shows that not every family is perfect and that when crime, inequality, and
addiction are present in the family dynamic, children are often left to their
own devices and must find peace in their never-ending suffering.
It is so significant that Jojo has this nurturing aspect about him. As you said, he must care for Kayla and soothe her after the abuse from Leonie and Michael. He is fortunate enough to take after Pop and Mam. However, as you state at the end of your blog. Leonie doesn’t have a single nurturing bone in her body. She is very selfish and seems to only care about Michael and drugs. What I find significant is the parts where she seems to have some character development and seems to finally step into the motherly figure is when she senses judgment or disapproval from Jojo. An example of this is during Big Joseph’s and Michael’s big fight, “I look over at my son and think for sure he’s smiling, for sure he can see how stupid all of it is, but he ain't looking at them tussling. He’s looking at me… Like he ain't no child of mine” (Ward 208). The right way to handle this situation as a mother is to take their children out of this traumatic environment. However, for Leonie, it takes Jojo’s powerful look to cause her to do the right thing. Although the damage is already done, both Jojo and Kayla witnessed the racist slurs and the fighting. It’s so interesting that it takes Jojo’s judgment to cause Leonie to have that small amount of care. Moreover, Leonie is essentially wired this way, she will never really be able to take on the full nurturing role of a mother.
ReplyDeleteThis idea of Jojo being the most nurturing and caring character in Sing, Unburied, Sing leads to other ideas about Jojo’s mindset. One that predominates, especially toward the end of the novel, is Jojo's understanding of Leonie. Despite all of her outrageous accounts of jealousy towards her own children and blatant child abuse, she is still a human being— a woman made up of her past. She acts in parallel to what she has come to know as "safe" and "reliable" in her world. After Leonie and Michael become distant at the house, Jojo finally has the emotional and physical distance to think about why Leonie acted the way she did. Eventually, through his presumed analyses, Jojo subconsciously determines that he will not end up like Leonie. That he will be different. Jojo describes this feeling as "unsettling. Deeper. It turns [him] awake every time [he] feels [himself] slipping." (279) Although Ward doesn’t give direct details as to what "slipping" means in the eyes of Jojo, one can infer that it is when he has thoughts or does actions that remind him of Leonie. The last thing he wants to do is replicate the horrible acts of his mother, so the constant haunting of her behavior keeps his mentality in line.
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