Uncovering the Dark Secrets Beneath the Surface in Matthew Morris’s The Tilling
The son of a Black father and white mother, Morris is often seen by others to be white, leading to a persistent disconnect between the ways in which he self-identifies, and how others perceive him. This discrepancy between the expectations of others — some seeking for him to “turn up” parts of himself — and his own, fosters a pervasive feeling not being perceived in his totality. This push-pull lies at the heart of the book’s explorations, set up in its first essay “Tragic Mulatto.” Addressed to “American you,” the essay sits on the foundation of the tragic mulatto trope that Sterling A. Brown posited leads to a “divided inheritance” and Morris says can lead to “never belonging anywhere but with other mixed folks.” While exploring the ways the tragic mulatto stereotype is “both false and true,” Morris also provides the reader with an antidote, one both personal and systemic: wholeness. “This mixed half-body is a mixed whole-body. Whole. Don’t break it / into sections. See through it/it through, American you.”
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