Themes: Growth and Moral Stature
Ultimately, the great achievement of Jazz is that Morrison goes beyond the mere illustration of how her characters are victims who survive; she dramatizes how they move beyond their victimization and grow in moral stature. When Violet is in the depths of her despair, Alice advises her, “You got anything left to you to love, anything at all, do it.” In their various ways, Joe, Violet, Felice, and the narrator all eventually absorb this all-important lesson: They learn to give and to receive a mature kind of love.
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