The conflict of Self

The best way to sum up Nel and Sula lies in a quote from the novel Sula. Morrison tells the reader that two very different black girls grew up in the Bottom. The first speaks of Nel, described by the narrator as one whose parents “had succeeded in rubbing [her] down to a dull glow any sparkle or sputter she had” (24). A townswoman describes “when Sula drank beer she never belched” (136). Obviously these two characters …

…ending comes for Sula. She dies in loneliness, not in freedom (Mickelson 316). The town does not even do anything about her death for three days. But Nel is left with a “fine cry—loud and long—but it had no bottom and it had no to, just circles and circles of sorrow” (Morrison 174). So in the end each of them prove that the do need love, and each other. They are part of one another.