"[A] major theme of [Morrison's] novels is the need for balance or wholeness. These qualities may be acquired by the characters in the novels only through an act that is analogous to one involved in the creation of art-an act of the imagination which comes from a willingness to see the world as others see it" (229).

As Tirrell concludes, "Without at least a minimally articulated notion of one's place in the community, one cannot be a moral agent" (124)

the importance of perception-"the ability to
discern, acutely and responsively, the salient features of one's particular situation"

"Moral knowledge ... is not simply intellectual grasp of propositions; it is not even simply intellectual grasp of particular facts; it is perception. It is seeing a complex, concrete reality in a highly lucid and richly responsive way; it is taking in what is there, with imagination and [intuitive, I might add] feeling" (152).

"Weekdays for you and weekends for him." (Polotan 179)

"'the dirtiest deal possible, Lourdes,' Red was saying, 'to be used by someone's unhappy wife'" (Polotan 187)

"The punishing flesh, the paroxysms, the engulfing pleasure that ended in long excruciating sobs - 'Leave all that alone, Red,' she said now, let love go when it must, Lourdes thought, but stay the mutilation" (Polotan 189)

"is put in the perverse position of acting as the object of the jouissance of the Other. One is overcome with guilt and fear for what one takes as one's responsibility for a wrong one knows oneself's committed but doesn’t comprehend. One's desire becomes immersed in an overwhelming, persecutory jouissance, marked by a “sticky-sweet, vomity”
sensation, the signifier of one's seducer’s obscene enjoyment."

"the Other’s demand/desire determines the answer of the object and thereby deprives one of response and protection...complicity with the Other, as a child, causes one's rejection of speech as an adult, leaving one in an impossible conflict between mute
guilt and rebellion against the law. One's forced choice of a choice the Other has already made for oneself deprives one of choice, of freedom, and makes one an unwilling active participant in the injustice"