Given Toni Morrison’s prominence—she won the Noble Prize for Literature in 1993—her works have received a flood of critical attention. One prominent line of critical inquiry is the role of music in her texts. Indeed, Morrison herself states, “Black Americans were sustained and healed and nurtured by the translation of their experience into art, above all music…in terms of aesthetics, the music is the mirror that gives me the necessary clarity.” Lars Eckstein’s contribution to this body of criticism is his examination of this issue within Morrison’s Pulitzer Prize winning text Beloved (1987), in which the fugitive slave Sethe kills her daughter rather than see her returned to slavery. Eckstein argues that within the context of this text and African American culture more generally, music has an “expressive potential” and enables African Americans to explore the suffering and painful experiences of the past that might otherwise remain unexpressed.

Which of the following most accurately illustrates Eckstein’s argument regarding the expressive capacity of music?

(A) An African American man uses country blues music to express his traumatic past as a slave.
(B) An African American man uses gospel music to foster a sense of community with African-American culture.
(C) An African American woman uses music to sustain and heal herself through painful experiences.
(D) An African American songwriter uses many biographical themes in her lyrics.
(E) An African American writer can mimic the style of many musical genres in written form.