Toni Morrison's fifth novel, Beloved (1987), won a Pulitzer Prize in 1988 and is an accurate portrayal of the black slave woman's experience. Beginning in pre-Civil War Kentucky, Beloved is the story of Sethe Suggs and her family. Nineteen years old and pregnant with her fourth child, Sethe wants nothing more than to free her family from slavery. The Suggses had been owned by Mr. Garner, a “humane slave master,” but when he dies his brother schoolteacher comes to run the plantation. The Suggses escape but schoolteacher finds them in Ohio, and when Sethe sees him approaching she tries to kill her children—to prevent their return to slavery—but only succeeds in killing her young daughter, Beloved. Realizing Sethe's intentions, schoolteacher leaves and Sethe serves a short jail sentence, nursing her newly born daughter, Denver. She then supports her family as a cook.
Beloved returns to haunt her mother's house. As a baby ghost she turns over tables and makes fingerprints in cakes, ultimately driving her two brothers away. When Paul D., a former slave from the same plantation, arrives at Sethe's house, he vanquishes the baby ghost by yelling and striking at the air, but she eventually returns as a twenty-year-old spirit in human form with a demanding infantile personality. Because of Sethe's guilt and the “rememory” of tortured slavery, Beloved is able to take over Sethe's mind, body, and heart, following her everywhere, questioning her endlessly, and causing Sethe's mental and physical deterioration. Beloved in turn grows fat to the point of appearing pregnant. Denver, who has isolated herself since she learned that her mother killed Beloved, decides that she must take action when Sethe quits her job and becomes increasingly unable to resist Beloved's outrageous demands for attention and food. Their resources depleted, Denver symbolically steps off her porch to ask the neighbors for help. They initially respond by mysteriously providing food, and later, when they hear tales of Beloved beating Sethe, they descend upon Sethe's house to perform a rite of exorcism. Humming, singing, and praying, they force Beloved to flee. Morrison hints that Beloved's human form disintegrates. Freedom from the ghost does not bring immediate health for Sethe, although it and the act of seeking assistance serve to reincorporate Denver into the community. Sethe languishes in an effort to will herself to death until Paul D returns to inspire her with a budding desire to live.
Morrison based the novel on the story of Margaret Garner, a slave who in circumstances similar to Sethe's killed one child and tried to kill her three others. The novel is important for depicting the concern slave mothers had for their children and their determination to win freedom for themselves and their offspring. It was critically acclaimed for its poetic language, intricate plot, and understanding portrayal of the forces that would cause Sethe to kill her child. Beloved acknowledges the horror of slavery and portrays the horrendous treatment and torturous memories of the slaves’ past while documenting the effect of this history on future generations of African Americans.
Bibliography
- Brian Finney, “Temporal Defamiliarization in Toni Morrison's Beloved,”
Obsidian II 18 (Spring 1990): 59–77. - Trudier Harris, Fiction and Folklore: The Novels of Toni Morrison, 1991.
- Sunny Falling-rain, “A Literary Patchwork Crazy Quilt: Toni Morrison's Beloved,”
Uncoverings 15 (1994): 110–140. - Deborah Guth, “‘Wonder What God Had in Mind’: Beloved's Dialogue with Christianity,”
Journal of Narrative Technique 24.2 (Spring 1994): 83–97. - Caroline Rody, “Toni Morrison's Beloved: History, ‘Rememory,’ and a Clamor for a Kiss,”
American Literary History 7.1 (Spring 1995): 92–119
Betty Taylor-Thompson
