Sula Discussion Questions: 1940
Page Question Response
138 What are the reasons that Nel visits
Sula?
140 Why does Sula send Nel out on an
errand almost as soon as Nel enters
the room?
141 What are some examples of Sula
letting “emotions dictate her
behavior” in the novel?
141 What do you think is wrong with
Sula?
142 Can Sula have it all or is she
deceiving herself?
142 What does Sula mean when she
suggests that being a black woman
and being a man are the same
thing?
143 Sula claims, “I sure did live in this
world.” In what ways has she lived
more or less than Nel?
143 To what extent do you admire
Sula’s conclusion: “I got me....my
lonely is mine”?
144 Examine Sula’s explanation for
taking Jude away from Nel.
144-5 Do you agree with Sula that you
don’t get anything for being good
to somebody?
145-6 When does Sula think she’ll be
loved, considering the examples
she gives?
146 What does Sula mean when she
hypothesizes that maybe she was
the good one, not Nel?
147 Why can’t Sula find any meaning
in life?
148-9 How are Plum, Chicken Little,
Shadrack, Eva, Hannah, and Nel all
present in Sula’s dying thoughts?
149 Identify Morrison's magic in the
final two lines of the chapter.
Sula Discussion Questions: 1941
Page Question Response
150-1 What effects does Sula’s death
have on the Bottom?
153-4 Morrison tells us, “...there was
something wrong.” If Sula
embodied evil, why does her
death affect the Bottom
negatively?
155 Analyze the oxymoron, “childish
dirge.” How does it apply to
Shadrack?
155 What does this paradox mean?:
“Shadrack had improved enough
to feel lonely.”
156-7 Does this page shed light on what
Shadrack meant by “Always,”
which he promised to Sula so
many years ago? (Notice the
very different significance of the
birthmark here.)
157 What is the irony of trying to
convince Sula of permanency?
158 Why is Shadrack, the leader, the
only participant not excited about
the final National Suicide Day?
160 Discuss Morrison’s use of the
parallel markers, “kept them” and
“who understood.”
161 Why does Morrison associate the
words “mouth” and “lip” with the
tunnel?
162 Why do the Bottom people end
up sacrificing themselves in their
attempt to “kill” the tunnel?
162 What does the grand self-
immolation have to do with
Sula’s death?
Sula Discussion Questions: 1965
Page Question Response
163 Why does Morrison follow “Things
were so much better in 1965" with
“...or so it seemed,” considering the
information in the rest of the
paragraph?
164 What do you make of the
generalization (Nel’s perception?):
“White people didn’t fret about
putting their old ones away?”
165 After Jude left, did Nel have any
choice but to “[pin] herself into a
tiny life”?
166 What does Nel mean when she
thinks, “It was sad, because the
Bottom had been a real place”?
168 Even in her craziness, how does Eva
pinpoint some painful truths?
169 Why does Nel, feeling so upset,
hurry away from Eva?
170 Why did watching Chicken Little
slip from Sula’s hands make Nel feel
good?
170 Is Nel “watching” Chicken Little die
related at all to Sula watching her
mother die? Why or why not?
172 Why is it appropriate that in death
Sula would possess a “giant yawn
that she never got to finish”?
173 Notice that Morrison applies the
word “lip” to both the “leaf-dead”
tunnel (bottom of p. 161) and to the
cemetery in which Sula is buried.
174 Given the structure of the first few
chapters of the novel, why is it fitting
that Nel and Shadrack pass each
other on the last page of the novel?
174 What discovery does Nel finally
make?
174 What is the significance of the word
“bottom” occurring in the final
sentence of the novel?