- Share thoughts on Twyla and Roberta's relationship with at least one quotation to support your interpretation.
- Pose an open-ended interpretation question to the next blogger.
- Respond the question offered by the last blogger.
- Optional: Respond to questions posted by other bloggers that weren't necessarily right before you but that interest you.
Looking forward to your thoughts!
i think that Twyla and reberta's relationship is very mixed. they met in a children's home of all places. but as reberta got older it seemed that she thought of herself as better than twyla. why would she think that?
ReplyDeleteTwyla and Roberta's relationship seem like a good one. There are like for an example: they were dumped by their parents, both have great life,. "My mother danced all night and Roberta's was sick."(page 1) "A year. I got married to a man who lives here. And you, you're married to, right?" (page 4.
ReplyDeleteBenjamin C Rosenthal
I think that she thinks she is better than twyla because she was showing off when she was with thos boys, about the whole jimmy hendrix thing. but later in the story when they were talking they seemed to excahange conversation very well and i dont feel that she is acting like she is better than the other. Could they ever get there original friendship back after all the years?
ReplyDeleteI dont think they can get back to their original friendship, too many things happened and tey just dont keep in contact. Twyla is just really naive abut everything. When Robeta blew her off in that resturant, tywla shouldve known she was just acting. Overall their relationship seems very shakey. Each time they meet it goes in a totally different direction. They both had a hard upbringing so they naturally gravitated twards each other; "we were dumped," twyla says it best. What is going to happen the next time they meet?
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure what will happen the next time they meet. I agree Margot' thought, their relationship is mixed, because sometimes they're rude, sometimes they're nice. They argue to each other a lot. " "Did you ever learn to read?" Watch" "Special of the day. Cream of corn soup. Entrees. Two dots and a wriggly line. Quiche. Chef salad, scallops" Do you think that they will meet each other again?
ReplyDeleteI think that Twyla and Roberta have the relationship where they only like each other when they feel like it. At some points, they talked and acknowledged each other and other times they totally ignored each other. "Roberta didn't acknowledge my presence in any way and i got to thinking maybe she didn't know i was there." Why are they doing that to each other? Also, yes I do believe that someday they will meet again.
ReplyDeleteI think that they're relationship in the children's home was good because they could only think of the things they have in common. "So for the moment it didn't matter that we looked like salt and pepper standing there and that's what the other kids called us sometimes. We were eight years old and got F's all the time."(2)It seemed like because they're parents weren't dead, they were outcasts so they decided to be outcasts together. Once they got into the real world and saw what they didn't have in common, they only focused on their differences. At the end they realized that their differences didn't really matter anymore. When they were children, was it a love-hate relationship, hate relationship and just being polite or a love relationship itself? Explain. I think they don't acknowledge each other at some points because of their peers (Mostly Roberta). Roberta was afraid of what her African Americans friends would think if she was friendly to Twyla.
ReplyDeleteThe reason that they were friends when they were young was because they had more in common with each other than they had with the other people that lived where they did. “We didn’t like each other all that much at first, but nobody else wanted to play with us because we weren’t real orphans…” (Walker 2) In reality they don’t have a lot to relate to each other with. This is probably why when they kept meeting it was mostly awkward. I think that they have a pretty basic relationship that’s not very deep. It is deep in one sense because they spent a lot of time together when they were young, but on the other hand neither seems to be very interested in reconnecting with the other. Were Roberta and Twyla really compatible as friends, or were they draw together simply because they didn’t fit with anyone else?
ReplyDelete~Paige M.
I think that Twyla and Roberta seem like they would/could have been really good friends if there was not a racism issue. Their conflict started with race, "I don't know, you acted sort of like you didn't want to know me then. "Oh Twyla, you know how it was in those days: black-white. You know how everything was," (7). The separation of blacks and whites was at the stem of their whole conflict. Without it, if the time at Howard Johnson's did not happen, and they met again in another situation, I think they really could have been friends. In response to what Paige said, I think Twyla and Roberta were really compatible as friends because they became such good friends when they were kids. If they were not compatible and just got pushed into spending time together, they probably would not have become so close. If Twyla and Roberta were of the same race, would they have stayed closer and as better friends over the years?
ReplyDeleteThe girls are both different races and they had different views, but they are still friends. We see this in the beginning when Twyla said “I liked the way she understood things so fast. So for the moment it didn’t matter that we looked like salt and pepper” (Morrison 2079).
ReplyDeleteIn response to Alli, I think that if the girls were the same race, they would have been better friends because their parents told them things about other races. If a parent tells a child something they have never had experience with, they are going to hear what the parents say and that is all the child knows. “And Mary, that’s my mother, she was right. Every now and then she would stop dancing long enough to tell me something important and one of the things she said was that they never washed their hair and they smelled funny” (Morrison 2079).
Do you think that the fact that what Twyla and Roberta’s parents said about other races stayed with them there whole lives? or did they get over those ideas and change them?
i think that Roberta's mother was institutionalized, but i dont think that Twyla knew that. '"And yours? Did she ever get well?" she smiled a tiny sad smile. "No. She never did."' i think that Twyla thought Roberta's mother was just ill.
ReplyDeleteI feel that the relationship between Twyla and Roberta changes with the time because of race. Using the timeline of meetings between the two, the civil rights movement passed as they met each other in new places, each meeting having a different opinion of each other.
ReplyDeleteWhy didn't the girls keep in touch with each other?
The relationship with Twyla and Roberta is mainly based on race and class. When they were younger of course they were friends they were going through the same thing but as they got older and realzied who they really where they lost touch, Twyla fit in more with the white lower class people and Robeta married and wealthy black man. But because of their passed they always tried keeping in touch.
ReplyDeleteThere lives and social status probably made it hard for the girls to really keep up with each other and stay in touch.
If they were constintly loosing touch with eachother, why did they bother to even try to keep in touch?
Eryn Daly
I think that Twyla and Roberta were origionally friends because they were naturally attracted to eachother, having been in a similar situation they were able to relate to eachother. On page 79 Twyla expresses it best when she says that she "liked that way Roberta understood things so fast." They didn't keep in touch because of the pressure being different races had when this story takes place.
ReplyDeleteWould the girls have ever been friends if they weren't in similar situations at the orphanage?
As the story progresses, the relationship between Twyla and Roberta seems to lessen. At the beginning, the two are just young kids at St. Bonny's who have a lot in common, with the parent situation. We were eight years old and got F's all the time."(2) As they got older, they saw each other less and didn't spend as much time together causing them to grow apart and created a few problems together.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Asher's question, I would say that they would never had been friends because they would've had nothing in common, and they probably wouldn't have met each other.
Would the relationship between these characters have suffered if the incident with Maggie didn't happen?
Both girls had similar situation with there parents at the beginning and were kind of like each other. Farther in the story they meet up at a couple of places talk about stuff. When they got older they were different. There relationship was as strong as when they were young. I think back then it was hard being friends with different race.
ReplyDeleteya i agree with Ryan L they started with equal oppurtunity but then changed as they got older, and the black one wasn't treated as well because they weren't given respect back then you know it was a while ago because they talk about jimi hendrix who died in the 1970s. which races do you think roberta and twilight are?
ReplyDeletei think that there relationship was very sparatic. but when it comes to deciding what race they are i still cannot tell, but i think that what the whole point of this story is
ReplyDeletegeoff lee
I think that Roberta and Twyla's relationship is and was completely dependent on the time they spent together at the orphanage and the experiences they shared there. When they were younger, they were treated more equally and thus had more in common, but when they got older, people started treating them differently because of their races, and they grew apart in similarity. The part in the story where Twyla is working at the restaurant and Roberta comes in dressed in expensive clothes and with other people is a good example of how different they became. Even Roberta herself treated Twyla with little respect; "I remembered Howard Johnson's and looking for a chance to speak only to be greeted with a stingy 'wow'," (Morrison 85). I don't think we can ever know what races Twyla and Roberta are, but like Geoff said, I think that's the point of the story.
ReplyDeleteDo you think that as the girls got older they became more seperated from echother because of their difference in race, or for another reason?
Alright, this is a bit late but better late then never.
ReplyDeleteI believe that as the girls got older they were seperated for another reason, versus for race. I believe this due to the face that the race of the girls was never really given to you, and as shown in class you are able to say the both girls could be stereotyped as either black or whie, thus the two girls share qualities of both stereotypes. I believe that the main issue is outside influences, first the issue of class because that came up a few times and also was what alot of people used to name what race each girl was. I also believe that the issue with what happened at the school could of happened no matter what race each girl is. It is incredably difficult to tell what the true reason the girls grew apart, mostly because race was not given to you, but I personally believe class played more of an issue in why they grew apart rather than race.
Do you think this story could be told without the issue of race being brought up? If yes, would it be as interesting of a read than it is with race?