I want to look at the way the narrator describes Daddy’s absent voice compared to how the narrator describes Mama’s present body. What happens is that the narrator attributes physical or sensual characteristics to Daddy (even when he isn’t present) and gives descriptions about the unwanted presence of Mama. This difference parallels Tasha’s confusion or discontent about the separation of her parents.
Tasha talks to her Dad on the phone for the first time since his departure and the narrator highlights the sound and color of his voice. They talk: “’Hey, Ladybug.’ Daddy’s voice was dark and smooth like a melted crayon” (15). His body is not physically present, but the narration gives his voice, a transient piece of audio, a tangible body, a smoothness and a visual color. Daddy is absent, but the narrator’s description gives the voice presence. His voice is warm enough to melt wax.
Two pages later, Tasha physically touches Mama in an embrace, and the narrator describes their connection in a different way compared to Tasha’s interaction with her Dad. When Mama is in Tasha’s room and instructs her to give a hug, Tasha hears “exhausted misery” in her voice. Tasha longs for her Daddy (in absence) but feels something different towards her mother (in presence). The narrator says “Mama squeezed Tasha…She felt, this time, the intensity of grown folks’ emotion and gasped with the heat of it. The hug lasted several unendurable moments more before Mama released her” (17). Mama is hungry for affection even while sharing physical proximity to her child. There is heat in the emotion between their skin. Those moments together are difficult for Tasha to bear.
These scenes differ in the way that Tasha experiences her father’s absence and mother’s presence. Daddy is not present, but his voice gets described in with tactile features. Mama is in the room with Tasha and their physical proximity is unbearable. This confusion of descriptions parallels and further expresses Tasha’s worry about the separation of her parents, their distancing, who will stay and who will go, and what it means for someone to stay.
Question1 : In Leaving Atlanta, are there any other moments where something absent is given presence, or vice versa? How is that moment related to this one?
Question 2: What marks the boundary between comforting touch and distressful touch in Leaving Atlanta or The Color Purple? How does the narrator draw the limit, with descriptive language, between touch that is wanted vs. unwanted? Find a passage from the text that serves as evidence to support your claim.