The Ties that Bind: Female Relationships in the Works of Gloria Naylor

The relationships between women, whether familial or based solely on friendship, are almost always complicated and complex. This is especially true when the women share common experience or goals. In the novels of Gloria Naylor she explores the relationships between women and gives insight into what makes them successful. In her first novel, The Women of Brewster Place , Naylor focuses on seven women, struggling to survive in a world that has never been kind to African-Americans or women.

Their environment further complicates their lives. Brewster Place is an impoverished and threatening neighborhood. Each woman, in her own way, plays an integral part in the making of Brewster Place. The women are forced to rely on each other when the world seems to shut them out. In Naylor's second novel, Linden Hills, the other half of the economic spectrum is explored. Linden Hills is an affluent neighborhood, in which everyone living there has reached some level of financial stability. However, despite their economic success, the people are emotionally and mentally empty.

Patterned after Dante's "Inferno," as the character reach farther for the American Dream and financial success, they sink lower and lower into the pits of hell. Both novels, although quite differently, explore the female relationship. They also explore the role that environment plays in either fostering or hindering these relationships. The female characters in The Women of Brewster Place are bound by a sense of community and sisterhood that enables them to deal with the everyday pressures they face in the male-dominated society in which they live. However in Linden Hills, more affluent female population of African-Americans suffer as a result of their environment and the lack of female connections