{"title":"The Face of the Other in Home","authors":"Jun Hu","doi":"10.1080/00144940.2022.2048778","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This essay investigates Toni Morrison’s novel Home (2012) by focusing on the link between Frank Money, a battered African American veteran of the Korean War, and the young Korean girl he kills at the battlefield. Critics have not paid enough attention to the ethical appeal from the Korean girl to Frank. This essay argues that she plays a very important role in the recovery and growth of Frank, who has been haunted by her smiling face before her death. By drawing on the theories of Emmanuel Levinas and Judith Butler about the ethical demand made by the other, this essay aims to explore what lies in the vulnerable face of the Korean girl and what prevents Frank initially from responding to her ethically. The essay claims that the transformation of Frank depends not only on his ability to confront his crime of killing the Korean girl, but also to realize and respond to the ethical appeal from her, and finally in mourning the Korean girl, Frank allies with her in the shared vulnerability of all the others in the society.","PeriodicalId":42643,"journal":{"name":"EXPLICATOR","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.2000,"publicationDate":"2022-03-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"EXPLICATOR","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00144940.2022.2048778","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"N/A","JCRName":"LITERATURE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Abstract This essay investigates Toni Morrison’s novel Home (2012) by focusing on the link between Frank Money, a battered African American veteran of the Korean War, and the young Korean girl he kills at the battlefield. Critics have not paid enough attention to the ethical appeal from the Korean girl to Frank. This essay argues that she plays a very important role in the recovery and growth of Frank, who has been haunted by her smiling face before her death. By drawing on the theories of Emmanuel Levinas and Judith Butler about the ethical demand made by the other, this essay aims to explore what lies in the vulnerable face of the Korean girl and what prevents Frank initially from responding to her ethically. The essay claims that the transformation of Frank depends not only on his ability to confront his crime of killing the Korean girl, but also to realize and respond to the ethical appeal from her, and finally in mourning the Korean girl, Frank allies with her in the shared vulnerability of all the others in the society.
期刊介绍：
Concentrating on works that are frequently anthologized and studied in college classrooms, The Explicator, with its yearly index of titles, is a must for college and university libraries and teachers of literature. Text-based criticism thrives in The Explicator. One of few in its class, the journal publishes concise notes on passages of prose and poetry. Each issue contains between 25 and 30 notes on works of literature, ranging from ancient Greek and Roman times to our own, from throughout the world. Students rely on The Explicator for insight into works they are studying.
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