Toni Morrison’s ‘Beloved’ is a story told against the backdrop of slavery in America. An African-American herself, Morrison weaves a powerful tale that reveals the real ugly psychological and historical truth about slavery. Most of the characters in the novel, including the protagonist Sethe, have been victimized by slavery in differing ways. Just as all human beings have been born with the gift of fighting against odds in life , these characters too resist by developing their own series of responses to the various adversities that confront them.
Sethe, a black woman, endures a series of horrific adversities. She responds positively several times while her seventh response is negative. Her first response, when she is molested by the nephews of a schoolteacher, is to report the misbehavior to Mrs. Garner in the hope that the perpetrators would be severely reprimanded. Her protest falls on deaf ears as and instead gains her a merciless whipping despite being pregnant. Seeing the futility of her action, her next response is to flee into the forest. From there, with the help of Amy Denver and Stamp Pad, she manages to reach the safety of Baby Suggs’s home. Sethe’s next adversity comes when the schoolteacher finds her and attempts to forcibly make her children and her return to Sweet Home. Her response to his is to run away with her children to the woodshed, where desperate at having no solution in sight, she exercises ‘rough choice,’ namely, opting to kill her children rather than let them return to the horrors of slavery that she experienced {“and split to the woodshed to kill her children” (Morrison 158)}. She succeeds in killing one of them – her elder daughter – with a handsaw. Sethe’s next faces adversity comes in the form of shamefully waiting in line for food with the rest of the black community in Cincinnati. She responds by thinking of herself as superior to the rest of the blacks, shunning the free food and instead of robbing food from the restaurant {“I pick up a little extra from the restaurant is all” (Morrison 67)}. Adversity next comes in the form of Beloved, who she is certain is the incarnation of the daughter she killed. Her response is to try her best to make up for her crime by satisfying each and every demand of Beloved to the extent of literally enslaving herself to the girl. Her next adversity is a mistaken one and takes place when Mr. Bodwin is wrongly believed by her to be the schoolteacher. She responds by rushing at him furiously with an ice pick with the aim of killing him. Her final adversity comes when Beloved disappears in response to the incursion of members of the Cincinnati black community at 124. Her response this time is negative. She gives up hope and retires to Baby Suggs’s bed to await death.
Sethe’s daughter Denver’s first adversity is years of relative isolation from the black community of Cincinnati. She responds bypassing long periods of time secluded in a secret haven within boxwood bushes that she fondly calls her ’emerald closet’ {“Denver’s world [was] flat, mostly, with the exception of an emerald closet standing seven feet high in the woods” (Morrison 37)}. Her second adversity is a feeling of exacerbated loneliness when the residential ghost of 124 is forced to depart by Paul D. Denver responds by resenting Paul D ferociously. Her third adversity occurs when Paul D and Sethe become lovers and the latter gives more and more attention to him, thereby making Denver feel jealous and isolated. Her response is to increase her resentment of Paul D. Denver’s final adversity is a combination of Beloved’s increasing tyranny over Sethe and her mother’s escalating submissiveness. She responds by leaving the house and resolutely creating her own identity in the Cincinnati black community by first asking for help from them to look after Sethe and Beloved, and then following it up to educating herself first by Miss Bodwin and later by joining the Oberlin College.
Although Beloved’s identity is elusive and complex, there is evidence in the book that reveals she is a normal woman who has been brutalized by a long period of slavery. Her response to adversity in the form of years of oppression is to respond by directing her pent-up emotions at Sethe. Beloved develops an obsessive attachment towards Sethe based on the latter’s guilt at murdering her elder daughter {“Sethe was trying to make up for the handsaw; Beloved was making her pay for it” (Morrison 251)}. Beloved’s next adversity begins with the arrival of Paul D at 124 and the subsequent sexual relationship that develops between him and Sethe. Beloved becomes jealous and responds by resenting Paul D, harassing him by directing him forcefully around the house {“she moved him from room to room, like a rag doll” (Morrison 221)} and forcing him to have sex with her. Beloved’s final adversity comes when Ella and other members of Cincinnati’s black community come to 124 {“they fell into three groups; those that believed in the worst; those that believed none of it; and those, like Ella, who thought it through” (Morrison 255)} to exorcise her from it. Seeing no way out, Beloved’s response is to quietly run away, never to return.
Baby Suggs response to several years of ill-treatment and degradation brought about by slavery is, upon becoming a free woman, to provide agitated and spiritual inspiration to Cincinnati’s black community by organizing religious meetings at the Clearing {“a wide-open space deep in the woods” (Morrison 87)}.
On the other hand, the response of Paul D to several years of slavery involving physical and emotional trauma is to suppress his bad memories and take a firm decision that the only way to survive is to not develop an attachment to anything in life.
Halle’s response to the adversity of being forced to watch his pregnant wife Sethe being violated by the schoolteacher’s nephews who steal her bodily secreted milk {“they took my milk and he saw it” (Morrison 69)} is to become so horrified that his sanity snaps and he becomes mad.
Lady Jones’ response to adversity in the form of isolation due to societal disapproval for being a mulatoo is to retain a strong feeling of societal obligation and educate children of Cincinnati who have been deprived of social privileges and rights in her unique house-school {“Lady Jones sat in a straight-backed chair; several children sat cross-legged on the floor in front of her” (Morrison 102)}.
In conclusion, ‘Beloved’ does well to lay bare the inhuman treatment meted out to African-American slaves during what was undoubtedly the blackest period in American history. Morrison does well to pay tribute to the indomitable spirit of mankind by showing how the African-Americans resisted the various adversities that came their way by developing their own unique responses ranging from the powerful to feeble . Toni Morrison, the author of powerful novels like ‘The Bluest Eye’ and ‘Sula’, has written another masterpiece in ‘Beloved’ thereby proving that she has few equals in the field of African-American fiction. It is no wonder therefore that she holds the distinction of being the first African-American to be awarded the Nobel Prize in 1993.
Reference
Morrison, Toni. “Beloved.” New York: Plume. 1998.