Sula Peace is one of the protagonists of the novel. She is born to a very unstable family and is from that moment treated differently in "the Bottom", the black section of Medallion, Ohio. From the time that she was very young, right up until her death, Sula denied her true emotions. She refuted her need for love and did not acknowledge her family and its impact on her.

Sula's need for love was first expressed in the beginning of the novel when she is twelve years old. Not realizing that Sula is nearby, Hannah, her mother says: "I love Sula. I just don't like her." Sula "only heard Hannah's words, and the pronouncement sent her flying up the stairs. In bewilderment, she stood at the window fingering the curtain edge, aware of a sting in her eye."(57) Sula did not show that her mother's words truly hurt her. She ran away

Sula's best friend and the other protagonist of Sula was Nel Wright. Nel was the exact opposite of Sula. Nel had a light skin color, almost like the color of sand; in contrast, Sula's skin was dark like the rich earth. Nel was the picture of innocence and purity; Sula had a birthmark in the shape of a rose over one of her eyes, giving an impression of something mysterious. Nel was a calm and constant person, while Sula could and would flare up with emotion. However, the two friends shared the fact that they both ran from their problems.

Although Helene Wright was not a protagonist in the novel, she like Sula and Nel ran away from her problems and her past. Helene married a distant cousin of hers and moved out of the racist South to a more accepting town of Medallion, Ohio. She also ran from the South to forget the life she lived there. Being raised by her grandmother because her mother was a prostitute who was incapable of raising a child. When Helene got notice to come to Louisiana because her grandmother was sick "She did not want to go, but she could not ignore the silent plea of the woman who had rescued her."(19). Helene did not want to go because she would once again have face her past in the racist streets of Louisiana. For her trip Helene sewed herself an elegant dress hoping that it would ease some tension of the fact that she was black. It was almost as if Helene was trying to hide the fact that she was black.

Although Sula, Nel, and Helene were all running from their past, it finally caught up to them. Sula as much as she did not like her other, became like her by becoming the town whore and sleeping around with the married men of Medallion. Nel who throughout the novel tried to break the social conscience shell her mother put her in, wound up worrying what the town would think of her. Helene Wright went back to Louisiana and was forced to look her mother

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1269
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)