Pilate & Macon

I've been enjoying Song of Solomon, and one of my favorite parts about the book is the characters. They're all very interesting, and Morrison keeps revealing more details about them. Ruth is a character that I initially wasn't that interested in -- she barely did anything at the beginning except obey Macon. I felt sympathy for her, but I wasn't really eager to read more about her. Pilate, on the other hand, is immediately interesting, especially as a contrast to her brother Macon. We talked about the differences between the Macon and the Dead households in class, and Pilate's household seems more alive and less stifling. Milkman wants to escape from his household to Pilate's. So I thought it was really interesting when we got a look into Ruth and Pilate's relationship. Pilate seems very motherly, especially when she threatens Reba's boyfriend -- she doesn't like to see people in trouble. So it makes sense that she would help Ruth. The interesting thing is that it also shows that Macon is still afraid of Pilate -- we saw that he's still intrigued by her when he passes by their house one night, but the fact that Pilate still has power over him and doesn't seem to be afraid of him is interesting. When Ruth gets pregnant, he suspects that Pilate had something to do with it, and when Pilate leaves a doll in his office, he behaves. Macon also seems very afraid of how his reputation could take due to his connection to Pilate. In a novel which is a lot about family, Milkman's sisters don't play much of a role, and both Reba and Hagar are only children, but the sibling dynamic between Macon and Pilate is very interesting and I hope we see more about it.