Lena's Rant
Lena’s Rant
Lena’s rant was strange especially after never hearing from Lena and often only seeing her as
connected to her sister and never really having a separate voice or action from First Corinthians.
Although we heard similar messages from Guitar when he tells Milkman to get serious with his life,
Lena seems to carry more gravitas when speaking to Milkman. We know he is drunk for at least part
of it, we can see this when he first talks back to Lena asking if she wants him to pee more. This causes
Lena to hit him which we are told sobers him up. Lena brings up plenty of good points that readers
maybe hadn’t noticed because when there are so many other characters who are doing bad things.
Compared to others, although Milkman seems arrested in his development, Milkman doesn’t seem
like a bad person. This can kind of blind the readers to see some of his shortcomings in the treatment
of the women in his life. Readers have a bad picture of Ruth because what Macon says about the
relationship of her and her father. Therefore, readers don't seem to have as much sympathy for her,
so it isn't as obvious how Milkman is rude to her. Also with First Corinthians and Lena, we don't really
think of them because of how they are characterized in the book. Although Milkman is, in theory, doing
a nice thing by preventing his sister from seeing a member of the 7 days he is a hypocrite because of
Guitar. Did you notice Milkman’s mistreatment of the women in his life? If not, was it for these reasons?
connected to her sister and never really having a separate voice or action from First Corinthians.
Although we heard similar messages from Guitar when he tells Milkman to get serious with his life,
Lena seems to carry more gravitas when speaking to Milkman. We know he is drunk for at least part
of it, we can see this when he first talks back to Lena asking if she wants him to pee more. This causes
Lena to hit him which we are told sobers him up. Lena brings up plenty of good points that readers
maybe hadn’t noticed because when there are so many other characters who are doing bad things.
Compared to others, although Milkman seems arrested in his development, Milkman doesn’t seem
like a bad person. This can kind of blind the readers to see some of his shortcomings in the treatment
of the women in his life. Readers have a bad picture of Ruth because what Macon says about the
relationship of her and her father. Therefore, readers don't seem to have as much sympathy for her,
so it isn't as obvious how Milkman is rude to her. Also with First Corinthians and Lena, we don't really
think of them because of how they are characterized in the book. Although Milkman is, in theory, doing
a nice thing by preventing his sister from seeing a member of the 7 days he is a hypocrite because of
Guitar. Did you notice Milkman’s mistreatment of the women in his life? If not, was it for these reasons?
I agree. I don't think Milkman is a bad person, but I think his coddled upbringing prevented him from developing a real sense of empathy. He doesn't care for his sisters' or mother's wellbeing, and initially after reading I felt like if he was trying to gain anything from telling Macon about her sister's relationship, he wants to feel better about himself. However, I think it's definitely possible that he was trying to do a nice thing for her because watching his aunt be forced to humiliate herself for him made him realize how much he weighs down all the women in his life.
ReplyDeleteOne other way that the book avoids showing the other side of Milkman's actions is through the fact that Milkman is the one narrating the story, and up until that point never questions his actions towards the women in his family. We only get a one-sided view of this (until Lena conveniently provides us with another), and that hinders our ability to truly judge Milkman's actions.
ReplyDeleteI think that Milkman's arrested development has made him very self-centered, rapidly dismissive of people as "crazy" and unthinking of how he is callous to the people around him. It takes Lena metaphorically and literally hitting Milkman in the face before he even starts to realize what he does to people but the end of the chapter is still ambiguous. Does he leave because he has taken Lena's words to heart, or does he leave as a way of avoiding the issue rather than facing it?
ReplyDeleteI don't think Milkman is necessarily a bad person, but I don't think he's really a good person either. I do think Milkman is a hypocrite for not wanting First to date Porter, because he is Guitar's friend and he shouldn't be the one to decide for First if she could handle that. He really shouldn't have say in anything she does especially because he hasn't ever done anything for her or really seemed to care about her or Lena. I guess I really didn't see how Milkman mistreated his mother and sisters because of how Ruth is portrayed as weird and bad and how Lena and First are really pushed into the background and are really never mentioned but when reading Lena's rant, I can see how Milkman has some shortcomings in the treatment of women in his life.
ReplyDeleteI agree with this. At first, I didn’t think that Milkman was that bad of a person until this rant. It really brought a new prospective for me on his character and I no longer this Milkman is good. I believe he just seems like a lazy grown man.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I was a little surprised by Lena's rant. I think that her grievances were a little unexpected to the reader because, as Lena points out, Milkman is very much in his own world and doesn't really pay attention to what's happening to the people around him. There is very little mention of Lena and Corinthians in the book up to this point outside a few stories from Milkman's childhood that they take part in. I think that Lena's argument that Milkman is selfish doesn't really sink in right away, until later in the book when he starts to realize that he takes his family for granted.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with this. I didn't think Milkman was all that bad until Lena went off like she did. Milkman was innocent in my eyes, and his father was the bad guy forcing him to do things he didn't want to do. We hadn't really seen the side of Milkman that Lena tells us about. It's this weird phenomenon where we don't really see what Lena yells about, but just hear about it from others. I'm sure it's true, but it's kind of weird to just hear about how horrible Milkman is to his family (especially with his epiphanies later on) without ever seeing it.
DeleteI also agree milkman is not a "bad guy". Very few characters in this book are one dimensional. Pilate, Ruth, Milkman, Macon 1 and 2, all have complexity we learn about through the novel. I think Lena's rant is well placed in the book. We are surprised by the abrupt criticism and keep it in mind in the quest part of the book. Lena's rant allows us to appreciate all the self reflection of Milkman
DeleteMilkman's actions are due to the fact he doesn't have the emotional experiences, memories, and capabilities in order to have any empathy for those around him. As many of the comments above discussed, he's been trapped in this bubble, and everyone around him always seem angry at the fact he can't empathize with him. Not only with Lena, but also Guitar.
ReplyDeleteI honestly did not see anything wrong with Milkman (except his quite obvious emotional immaturity) until Lena had confronted him. She brought up some understandable points, and I think because Milkman is the protagonist and we only see things from his perspective & not from the perspective of others, we couldn't see his obvious shortcomings until she brought them up. To be honest I kind of agreed with some of the stuff Lena was saying though.
ReplyDeleteThis scene definitely seems to serve as a wake up call for the reader, in addition to being one for Milkman. Because of the limited perspective from which the book is narrated it is hard for us to understand just how ungrateful and dependent Milkman is. Lena's rant allows us to see Milkman in an entirely new and unflattering light.
ReplyDeleteLena wake us up to how Milkman's actions is really affecting everybody. The thing is, this doesn't necessary make Milkman a bad guy or the villain of the family. Despite us being blinded by Milkman's perspective, it gives us an insight that he really trying to do good. The thing is that he is acting like a teenager and thinks like a teenager. Even though he means good, he doesn't consider the consequences and the things around him before doing something, like a teenager would. I feel like he is blinded by his own will to do good.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that Morrison kind of made women exist only in the background of Milkman's life for most of SoS. I think it made the parts when women are more in the foreground, like Lena's rant and all of Pilates cool moments, more significant. Also, I think that Morrison's decision to make them seem less significant was ultimately a feminist choice, as it both depicts the way men like Milkman disregard women, and allows Milkman to eventually realize the significance of the women in his life.
ReplyDelete