Recitatif

Toni Morrison's short story Recitatif is about race relations and how they impact two girls as they grow up during the racially volatile mid-20th century (Mays, 2014). The title is reminiscent of recitation, which is reading aloud in public or playing a piece of music for an audience. By comparison, an aperitif is an alcoholic drink consumed before a meal to whet the appetite. Recitatif would therefore represent a public reading to whet the appetite of the audience. When applied to the theme of Morrison's short story, recitatif represents a whetting of the appetite for understanding what it is like to be Black in America. This is accomplished for the reader by placing them in the head of the White girl as she is treated as inferior by the African-American girl. This forces American readers out of their comfort zone and into an alternate reality where class and race...
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