The Beloved

Beloved

Toni Morrison’s Pulitzer Prize’ winning novel titled “Beloved” focused on the effect of slavery and the emancipation of slaves on black people. The novel starts in 1873 showing the aftermath of slavery and the Civil War. It highlighted not only the historical narratives of the Negroes being slaves but also dealt with the very painful, unthinkable and unimaginable aspects of slavery, such as sexual abuse, morality, justice and violence. In the novel, the author explored the effects of slavery on the main characters of the story using historical imagery.

The novel basically reveals the story of every character who was once a slave who just can’t find way to free themselves from the painful memories of their past. Sethe, the central figure of the novel who was once a slave made herself very busy all through out the novel by showing that she lives to beat her past -the past which she had a hard time escaping.

Images of what transpired in her past through clear narrations were mainly used by the author to lead the readers understand why the central character of the story

behaves in such a way that makes the reader assume that her story as a slave in the past molded her in the way she lives in the present.

In an effort to keep her children out of slavery, Sethe murdered one of them twenty years ago. It was morally wrong for her to murder her own daughter but she felt that it was the best thing to do as she would rather see herself suffer in prison than see her children live without directions for being slaves. Twenty years later, the main action of the story revolves around the return of a young lady named Beloved whom Sethe comes to believe, her murdered child. Beloved’s return to the once quiet house consumes Sethe to the point that she unmindfully ignores her other relationships and even to her own needs. Sethe’s boldness, courage, independence and overflowing kind of maternal love have made her stand out from the other Negroes in her community. She is full of love for her children and has the enormous range of willingness to make any sacrifice for them. Although the readers can figure that Sethe is living a directionless life for she is not living for the present nor for the future, but for her past, it was worth stressing that her kind of unselfish love for her children made such an incredible mark and impression to the readers that she will continually fight against slavery. "I will never run from another thing on this earth," she pronounces to Paul D early in the novel. Her love is a unique kind - it is a strong, brave, daring and unconditional love for a black woman, whose children may be stripped from her at any time just because of slavery.

On the other hand, the song entitled “Go Down Moses” which directly

emphasizes in its lyrics the words that were spoken by the Lord to Moses to go unto

Pharaoh and deliver the message, “Let my people go, that they may serve me,” renders a protest also against slavery. It describes events in the Old Testament