BELOVED BY TONI MORRISON AS A SLAVE NARRATIVE

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AFRO-AMERICAN LITERATURE
RESEARCH PAPER
Discuss Beloved as a slave narrative, which is personal, communal and
historical.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of
wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch
of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the
spring of hope, it was the winter of despair!” (A Tale of the Two Cities 1). The era
of slavery was the best of times for the slave dealers who were bagging a lot of profit
from this wicked business. However, it was the worst of times for the victims
(slaves) who went through innumerable physical and psychological tortures. The
period of slavery, was the most turbulent time in the black history that
snatched away the identity of African Americans and wrecked them
psychologically and physically.
In order to provide a detail account of slavery in America, Morrison’s
novel Beloved plays a vital role. Beloved narrates the historical story of Margaret
Garner, an African slave who killed her daughter in order to keep her from being
returned to slavery. Revolving around this historical event, Beloved presents the
reader with glimpses of the past that had been lost to the ravages of forced silences
and oppression. As critic, Marrie Burns says, “Beloved exposes the inhumanities
of the American slavery system and its impacts on the African
Americans” (2). Beloved depicts the circumstances of the era of slavery and its
aftermaths on its victims. It explores the physical, emotional and spiritual
devastation wrought by slavery, a devastation that continues to haunt the victims
even in the era of freedom. In the novel, the past has a central role, excavating the
turbulent slavery in America. The story of Margaret Garner provides the backbone

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for the story of Sethe. Like Garner, Sethe went through innumerable tortures in the
era of slavery and ended up committing infanticide.
Beloved unveils the story of Sethe, a former slave who lost her precious
relations in the era of slavery. She vaguely remembers her mother who used to toil
all day without any break. She would work from dawn to midnight and hardly got
any time to visit Sethe. However, she does remember that her mother showed her a
mark that she got from the slave masters and her mother told her that if something
terrible happened to her and Sethe could not tell her identity from her face, she would
know by the mark. However, when Sethe’s mother was brutally beaten and hanged
to death, Sethe tried to identify the dead body of her mother from that mark but all
the dead bodies of the slaves were so mutilated that she could not make out the mark.
Sethe’s links to her mother are painful. Although her mother did not get to
raise her but the harsh circumstances led both of them to commit infanticide.
Psychologically crippled, Sethe tries to suppress her turbulent past marred by slavery
and oppression, in order to live her life normally, however it seems as the more she
tries to suppress it the more it recurs in her life. Sethe remembers the incident from
her past when she was beaten so brutally that her back has a permanent scar that she
calls a ‘chokecherry tree’. Although she cannot see the sign but knows that, it is
always there. The significance of this obscene scar highlights the fact that her past
is just one thing that she cannot see but knows that it is always there, gnawing at her
soul.
The novel unveils another incident that reveals her psychological and physical
turmoil that stemmed from her heinous experiences of slavery and cripples her
present. After killing Beloved, when Sethe wanted a proper burial of her murdered
daughter and wanted to carve thirteen letters on her gravestone that were ‘Dearly
Beloved’, she ran out of money and the cruel carver took advantage of the situation.

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Instead of sympathizing with her as she lost her kid, he exploited her and raped her
in order to carve seven letters on the gravestone, a single word that was ‘Beloved’.
After going through innumerable tortures, Sethe’s life has reduced to little
more than vice and rumor. During the conversation with Paul D, Sethe reveals the
dilemma of her life. She compares her life to a tedious journey and says, “I took one
journey and I paid for the ticket, but let me tell you something, Paul D Garner:
it cost too much!” (15). The demons of slavery and racism, haunts Sethe even in
the era of freedom and lock her into a cage of physical and psychological paralysis
from where she cannot progress. However, she tries very hard to move on in life but
the memories of her past never let her go. Her past, (marred by slavery and butchery)
that returns in the form of ghost of Beloved initiates a new slave narrative. The image
of ghost unveils a story that is filled with human treacheries and human sufferings,
a heart-breaking story that can bring tears even in the eyes of the dead. Beloved
highlights a story of slavery whose words are stained with blood of an innocent child
that was born to die a gruesome death; however, the conductor of the gruesome death
of the child was not ‘Ezraeil’ (the angel of death) but the beast of slavery.
BIBLIOGRAPHY/ WORKS CITED:
Burns, Marrie. “Toni Morrison’s Beloved analyzed in the context of the African
American
experience of slavery, and slave narratives.” np.n.d. 1. Print.
Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities. Great Britain: James Nesbit & Company,
Limited, 1902. 1. Print.
Morrison, Toni. Beloved. London: Vintage Random House, 1997. 15. Print.
(The End)