Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison is a brilliantly written novel that accurately depicts racial and social tensions between blacks and whites. Morrison chooses the setting of Shalimar, Virginia and Danville, Pennsylvania, during the late 1930's through the 1960's, where she covey's her story through the third person as an omniscient author. In order to emphasize the racial conflicts throughout Song of Solomon, Morrison carefully chooses names for her characters with an emphasis on misnaming motifs.

A motif is defined as, "a unifying element in an artistic work, especially any recurrent image, symbol, theme, character, type, subject, or narrative detail" (Murfin and Ray 224). Toni Morrison uses misnaming motifs to aid in developin

g a main theme in Song of Solomon. Their repetitive nature allows a reader to get a closer glimpse into the author's thoughts and central ideas.

Morrison uses these motifs and many others throughout the novel to enlighten and entertain the reader. I find them to be an extremely useful tool that helps a reader to focus on the intimate feelings that the author wishes to portray.

The misnaming motifs that I noticed thus far are found in the following characters names: Guitar, Macon Dead, and Milkman. Guitar is a name of a character in the novel, not because he plays the guitar, but because he had a desire to play. When asked if he was named Guitar due to his usage of the instrument, guitar replies, "Not cause I do play. Because I wanted to" (Morrison 45). It appears that Morris

Some common words found in the essay are:
Papa Macon, Milkman Guitar, Toni Morrison, Solomon Morrison, Song Solomon, Macon Dead, Danville Pennsylvania, song solomon, misnaming motifs, Murfin Ray, toni morrison, macon dead, solomon toni, blacks whites, song solomon toni, solomon toni morrison, Solomon Toni,
Approximate Word count = 533
Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)