Morrison : The Story Of Beloved By Toni Morrison

The past comes back to haunt accurately in Beloved. Written by Toni Morrison, a prominent African-American author and Noble Prize winner for literature, the novel Beloved focuses on Sethe, a former slave who killed her daughter, Beloved, before the story begins. Beloved returns symbolically in the psychological issues of each character and literally in human form. The novel is inspired by the true story of Margaret Garner, a slave in the 1850s, who committed infanticide by killing her child. Barbara Schapiro, the author of “The Bonds of Love and the Boundaries of Self in Toni Morrison’s Beloved”, Andrew Levy, the author of “Telling Beloved”, and Karla F.C. Holloway, the author of “Beloved: A Spiritual”, present ideas of the loss of psychological freedom, the story being “unspeakable”, Beloved being the past, and the narrative structures of the story rewriting history.

After reading Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved, I could not help but feel shocked and taken aback by the detailed picture of life she painted for slaves at the time in American history. The grotesque and twisted nature of life during the era of slavery in America is an opposite world from the politically correct world of 2016. Morrison did not hold back about the harsh realities of slavery. Based on a true story, Toni Morrison wrote Beloved about the life of Sethe, a slave and her family. Toni Morrison left no stone unturned when describing the impact slavery on had the life of slaves. She dove deeper than the surface level of simply elaborating on how terrible it is to be “owned” and forced to do manual labor. Morrison describes in detail, the horrors and profoundly negative impacts slavery had on family bonds, humanity of all people involved and the slaves sense of self even after they acquired their freedom.

In her novel Beloved, Toni Morrison spins an intricate web between names and numbers for the reader to unravel. The deep connection that lies between names and numbers is a direct correspondence to the identity and worth of black people during slavery. Beloved begins with the identity of the house which is characterized by a number. The house is given a temperament as if it is a living, breathing entity and yet it still referred to as a number. The significance of this is symbolic to the plight of the black slaves. Regarded as little above the common animal, slaves were defined by their selling price, essentially they were reduced to a number. Viewed as nonbeings they nevertheless feel and suffer their place in the south. The character Beloved is similar in this regard as well. All that defines her is an age and a name that remains unfluctuating through time. In an insufferable and cruel world, names and numbers play a critical role in understanding the identity of black existence in the South. To uncover the implications and nuances that names and numbers play will be instrumental to delving into the lives of black slaves. Beloved contains a vast amount of names and numbers and the connections between them deepen the novel and provide mammoth insight into understanding and interpreting Morrison’s work and purpose for juxtaposing such elaborate bonds between names and numbers.

Morrison’s Beloved uses characters in her story to show the long lasting effects of slavery. Characters such as Sethe, Denver, and Beloved all show a different point of view of the effects of slavery and what life it can conjure up for over protective mother, hermit like daughter, and the spiteful ghost.

Sethe and her daughter Denver live in a house 124 that just happens to be haunted by the ghost of Sethe's first child. She invites Paul D a man she hasn't seen in 18 years into her house to talk. Paul D always had liked Sethe. She was sent there to replace Baby Suggs whose son, Halle, Sethe's husband brought her freedom. Sethe and Denver start to talk about Sweet Home and she tells him about her scar and how it looks like a tree and he caresses her and starts to kiss her scars. When he began doing this the ghost of the house gets angry and begans to shake but eventually Paul D. scares the ghost away.

So often, the old adage, "History always repeats itself," rings true due to a failure to truly confront the past, especially when the memory of a period of time sparks profoundly negative emotions ranging from anguish to anger. However, danger lies in failing to recognize history or in the inability to reconcile the mistakes of the past. In her novel, Beloved, Toni Morrison explores the relationship between the past, present and future. Because the horrors of slavery cause so much pain for slaves who endured physical abuse as well as psychological and emotional hardships, former slaves may try to block out the pain, failing to reconcile with their past. However, when Sethe, one of the novel's central characters fails to confront

Toni Morrison brings another surprise to the story of Beloved. The addition of character Beloved conceals whole meaning Morrison tries to conduct to the readers. So far, character Beloved is portrayed as an innocent, pure, yet egotistic girl. Beloved also presumably the incarnation of Sethe’s dead baby, whose tomb is engraved Beloved. Morrison offers supernatural element in the story to create mysterious and spooky atmosphere, which raise curiosity and excite readers even more.

     Toni Morrison's Beloved - a novel that addresses the cruelties that result from slavery.  Morrison depicts the African American's quest for a new life while showing the difficult task of escaping the past.  The African American simply wants to claim freedom and create a sense of community.  In Beloved, the characters suffer not from slavery itself, but as a result of slavery - that is to say the pain occurs as they reconstruct themselves, their families, and their communities only "after the devastation of slavery" (Kubitschek 115).  Throughout the novel, Morrison utilizes color as a symbolic tool to represent a free, safe, happy life as well as involvement in community and

The primary locations in this novel is in Sweet Home, a small farm containing slaves in Kentucky, and 124 Bluestone Road on the edge of Cincinnati, Ohio. Although the novel starts out in the home of Sethe and her daughter, Denver, Sweet Home is where Sethe’s experiences to the past begins. In Sweet Home, the slave system was taken over by Mr. and Mrs. Garner, a kind couple who treated their slaves like human beings. 124 becomes personified through the paranormal activities in the house, and through the chapter names; 124 was spiteful, 124 was loud, and 124 was quiet. Mr. Bodwin, the owner of 124, tells how the house has a history of paranoia, "Women died there: his mother, grandmother, an aunt and an older sister before he was born" (259).

Toni Morrison’s Pulitzer Prize winning book Beloved, is a historical novel that serves as a memorial for those who died during the perils of slavery. The novel serves as a voice that speaks for the silenced reality of slavery for both men and women. Morrison in this novel gives a voice to those who were denied one, in particular African American women. It is a novel that rediscovers the African American experience. The novel undermines the conventional idea of a story’s time scheme. Instead, Morrison combines the past and the present together. The book is set up as a circling of memories of the past, which continuously reoccur in the book. The past is embedded in the present, and the present has no

Morrison and Twain each present freed slave mothers as self-sacrificing. Each woman 's traumatic experiences as slaves create a deep fear of her children 's enslavement. In Morrison 's Beloved, Sethe is so distressed by her past; she murders her child to save her from slavery. Morrison uses Sethe 's drastic sacrifice to comment on slavery 's psychological effects. Meanwhile, Twain 's Pudd 'n Head Wilson portrays Roxy as a sacrificial mother to create sympathy for black people. From a cultural perspective, Roxy counters all of the propaganda about black people in the nineteenth century. Roxy plans to kill her son and herself, but figures out a different way to save her son from slavery. Both characters are selfless mothers, but the authors use this sacrificial behavior to prove different points about slavery. Morrison uses her characters selflessness to show the distress slavery can cause, while Twain capitalizes on the sympathy it creates to humanize black people in the public 's view.

If ignorance is bliss, then why is it human nature to uncover the truth? In Toni Morrison’s Beloved, the character Denver uses knowledge to feed her craving in hopes that it will fill the void her mother unsuccessfully tried to satisfy with the blood of the past and too little milk. To understand these truths one must accept that Beloved is a physical representation of the past, Sethe embodies the present, and Denver exemplifies the future. Throughout the novel these three characters interact on a superficial level, but each action has a deeper underlying influence on the other. This is why Denver’s assumed motive of using the attachment she forged with Beloved to develop a closer relationship with Sethe is cursory. When in fact it was for

 Toni Morrison’s powerful novel Beloved is based on the aftermath of slavery and the horrific burden of slavery’s hidden sins.  Morrison chooses to depict the characters that were brutalized in the life of slavery as strong-willed and capable of overcoming such trauma.  This is made possible through the healing of many significant characters, especially Sethe.  Sethe is relieved of her painful agony of escaping Sweet Home as well as dealing with pregnancy with the help of young Amy Denver and Baby Suggs.  Paul D’s contributions to the symbolic healing take place in the attempt to help her erase the past.  Denver plays the most significant role in Sethe’s healing in that she brings the community’s support

Having to already experienced slavery, Baby Suggs couldn’t control her feeling of anxiety as she waits for Halle’s arrival from Sweet Home plantation to 124 Bluestone Road. In Baby Suggs’s mind, it is filled with worries and “thoughts that if Halle made it, God do what He would, it would be a cause for a celebration...When the children arrived and no Sethe, she was afraid and grateful,” (Morrison 135). Baby Suggs was too anxious to have any sort of celebration because she was too accustomed to negativity and personal loss from her time in slavery. Although Baby Suggs is happy that the children made it safely to 124, she truly desired her only loving child, Halle, to return to her. Her reputation is destroyed when her generosity was mistaken for pride.

The novel commences with the introduction of this particular family setting. Sethe initially had two daughters and two sons. During their escape from their slave master, she lost one of her daughters as her two sons went away from home. Sethe is married to Paul D who is the father figure in the family setting. After their escape from slavery they settled in 124 Bluestone Road, Cincinnati (Koolish 67). The society in this area is mostly slaves who escaped from their masters. The neighborhood is however, good for settlement as both Sethe and Paul D felt comfortable in the region.