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Rylee Gatto

Seton Hill University

SEL 266 01: American Literature Survey, 1776 to Present

Professor Wansor

10/26/2021

Pilate Dead is One Interesting Woman

Toni Morrison is a notorious author; she has won many prestigious awards, including the

Pulitzer Prize. Within her novels she is known for sharing her radical ideas throughout

characters. All authors put a piece of themselves into books that they create. Pilate is the most

interesting character in the book because Pilate reflects our author, Toni Morrison.

Both Toni Morrison and Pilate appreciate their lives and try to make the world a better

place for the people around them. Toni Morrison is an outspoken activist regarding the civil

rights movement. In many of her novels she was able to share many issues on the civil rights

movement and racial justice. Even though her book, Song of Solomon, was a fictional novel

about the struggles of black people and the separation of social class within society; she still

referenced many different relevant historical events. In the book she referenced the death of 14-

year-old Emmett Till and Malcolm X. With the use of Emmett Till’s story, Toni Morrison was

able to juxtapose the treatment that white people receive for murder to the treatment that black

people receive for the same offense. Toni Morrison wants to lead people in the right direction in

life; she wants justice for people of color. She also wants to educate white people on racism.

Like Toni Morrison, Pilate also wants to lead people in the right direction. Throughout the

passage Pilate is seen as our protagonist, she is the moral consciousness within all the characters

in the book. Toni Morrison and Pilate are the voices of humanity for the black community. Both
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women are strong and loving; they both deny being a victim of racism and discrimination. Pilate

was born without a navel, so she receives plenty of disheartening comments from people around

her, “Finally Pilate began to take offense. Although she was hampered by huge ignorances, but

not in any way unintelligent, when she realized what her situation in the world was and would

probably always be she threw away every assumption she had learned and began at zero.”

(Morrison, 234). Pilate stopped letting things bother her; instead, she began living freely. No

person, white or black, would tell her that she was inferior. She was finally at peace with herself

and who she was as a person making her the perfect motherly figure. Neither Toni Morrison nor

Pilate would let discrimination or racism dictate their lives.

Within their communities, fictional or real life, Toni Morrison and Pilate played the

motherly figure. In Toni Morrison’s novels, there is a reoccurring theme about a black woman

who rejects the social norms and instead lives freely. This portrayal is very evident in Pilate; the

only thing that Pilate cares about in the book is relationships, “She gave up, apparently, all

interest in table manners or hygiene, but acquired a deep concern for and about human

relationships.” (Morrison, 235). Instead of being driven by money or social standing Pilate lived

humbly and welcomed everyone into her home unless they were doing harm to one another.

Throughout the book Pilate appreciates all the relationships that have transpired; when Pilate

dies she leaves us with some unforgettable last words, “I wish I’d a knowed more people. I

would of loved ’em all. If I’d a knowed more, I would a loved more.” (Morrison, 510). Guitar

accidentally kills Pilate; instead, her only regret was not knowing enough people. She didn’t

have any bad intent towards Guitar. At that moment she knew it was her time, she knew that she

was able to change Milkman and how he saw the world. She welcomed everyone into her home

without expecting anything from them except kindness towards herself. Pilate was more of a
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motherly figure to Milkman than Ruth was to Milkman. Towards the end of the book Pilate

taught Milkman a lot more than his mother ever did. Ruth viewed her child as remembrance of

what she and her husband had. She never cared and nurtured Milkman as a son but as something

she felt she had to protect. She was protecting the last bit of love that Macon Dead Jr. had for

her. Whereas Pilate raised her own daughter and granddaughter as if they were one; she never

chose between Reba or Hagar and loved them both dearly. Pilate would do anything for the ones

she loved and its evident in the passage when she threatened Reba’s boyfriend. She would go

against any man for the ones she loved.

Toni Morrison includes much of her own life and culture into the book through Pilate. In

African culture we can view Pilate as an elder who practices voodoo; more specifically she is a

healer. Even though Pilates name is associated with someone who killed Christ, she refuses to

allow her name to decide her fate. The reason her father picked the name was because the shape

of it reminded him of a tree, “and since he could not read a word, chose a group of letters that

seemed to him strong and handsome; saw in them a large figure that looked like a tree hanging in

some princely but protective way over a row of smaller trees.” (Morrison, 42). During the birth

of Pilate her mother didn’t survive; however, Pilate’s father still looked to her as a tree that

would protect other trees. The symbolism behind the tree is rebirth. Though Pilate didn’t want

her name to decide her fate, it did in some ways. The meaning her father intended for her name

to be is protector, and Pilate lived up to that name. Up until the very end Pilate was a protector

of those she loved. Toni Morrison looks towards her African roots and, like Pilate, is very proud

of them.

The most important thing to note is Toni Morrison’s relationship with her father. This

relationship is like that of Pilate’s connection with her father. Morrison opens up to the reader at
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the beginning of the book as to why she wrote the book and her response was that she was

inspired by her father, “He carried a letter from me in his coat pocket for years and years, and

drove through blinding snow-storms to help me. Most important, he talked to each of us in

language cut to our different understandings. He had a flattering view of me as someone

interesting, capable, witty, smart, high-spirited. I did not share that view of myself, and

wondered why he held it. But it was the death of that girl—the one who lived in his head—that I

mourned when he died.” (Morrison, 14). Both Pilate and Toni Morrison tried to meet their

father’s vision of them. They both knew after the passing’s of their fathers that they had to

withhold their wishes even after death. This idea pushed Pilate and Toni Morrison into the

powerful black women that they became. As a character, Pilate is a visionary of what Toni

Morrison strives to be and what she believes her father wanted to see from her. This book is

dedicated to her beloved father and to the person who she wishes she could’ve been for him.

When authors create characters, they tend to put pieces of themselves into these

characters. Within the book Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison inserted herself into many different

characters. Pilate is the most interesting character within the book because she most reflects who

Toni Morrison is as a person. Our author includes many different allusions of her own life and

culture into the book through Pilate. Toni Morrison depicts Pilate as a motherly, strong black

woman who would do anything for those she loves. She created Pilate based off her love for her

father; Pilate is a visionary of who Toni Morrison wishes she could be.