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How Does Sethe Hold Back The Past?

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Early in the novel, Sethe reveals another former slave Paul D as her sweetheart (Morrison 56). When Paul D arrives, it brings back her horrendous past, which Sethe is struggling to overlook. On the other hand, Paul D is ready to leave his slave days behind and focus on his new life as a free man. While, Sethe is trying to recover from the fact that she murdered her own daughter, because she did not want Beloved to be sold and put into slavery. Another struggle from her past is her escape from slavery. However, she cannot hold back the past because there appears to be a spirit haunting her. This spirit happens to be her daughter Beloved. The arrival of Beloved had a huge impact on the Sethe’s life. When Beloved was discovered by Sethe, she is
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James Good Mr. Young English 11 17 March 2023 Sacrifice and Personal Growth in Beloved When the reader first meets Denver, she is trying to communicate with the ghost of the baby that her mother killed, while Sethe reminisces about her children and notes that Denver is the only one left. Later, after Beloved has returned, Sethe begins to distance herself from Denver, becoming obsessive in her care of and attendance to Beloved. Without enough to eat, Denver actively allows her family to have her portions, which causes her well-being to decline rapidly. Thesis: Denver’s inherent fear of Sethe leads to her developing self-sacrificial tendencies and a mature sense of responsibility in order to protect her family at the expense of her life and

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Through the birth to her four children, Sethe finally makes the transition from owned to owner: a transition that ultimately elucidates her act of infanticide. In the scene describing schoolteacher’s approach, the narrator writes, “She just flew. Collected every bit of life she had made, all the parts of her that were precious and fine and beautiful” (192). By referring to her children as “every bit of life she had made”, the narrator displays the maternal claim Sethe feels for her children. After years of being property and having none, Sethe treasures her one and only bit of property- her children- and refuses to abuse the responsibility that accompanies that ownership.

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In Beloved by Toni Morrison, the author often utilizes many different writing techniques to emphasize the story’s main idea that one cannot let past mistakes dictate one’s life and future. Morrison’s application of nonlinear exposition in Beloved helps convey the novel’s main theme by allowing the reader to witness Sethe’s journey to self-acceptance through her personal flashbacks and Paul D.’s point of view. From the beginning, the author incorporates a flashback to illustrate how Sethe is burdened with guilt from killing her baby daughter. Morrison makes it clear to the reader that Beloved is constantly on Sethe’s mind.

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A key feminine quality for women in general around this time period was their capacity for being a mother. Throughout the story, Beloved is one of the many memories that haunts Sethe which she tries to repress in vain because she attempted to murder her own child in order to save them from the same physical, emotional, and sexual abuse that she endured during her time working at Sweet Home. However, Morrison depicts this as an act of kindness. Sethe 's character is given a connection to the audience for her motherly instincts, but also a way for the audience to reflect on the fact that her attempted murders were out of motherly love and protection. Placing Sethe in the scope of many women of the time who had lived without the harshness of slavery are forced to confront the weight of a decision that they never had to make nor most likely ever will.

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Sethe cares for Beloved, making her the first priority. Sethe even finds comfort in caring for Beloved, the parasitic and manipulative behavior of trauma is seen in this. The actions of Beloved put up an illusion for Sethe, forcing her to define her life by Beloved herself. These illusionary beliefs are also seen in

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All the while, Beloved is distracted by her need for revenge on her mother, taking advantage of the attention Sethe gives her. Instead of realizing that this attention is all she really desires, Beloved takes a turn for the worse, slowly wearing her loving mother

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Toni Morrison’s 1987 novel Beloved is a multiply narrated story of having to come to terms with the past to be able to move forward. Set after the Civil War in 1870s, the novel centers on the experiences of the family of Baby Suggs, Sethe, Denver, and Paul D and on how they try to confront their past with the arrival of Beloved. Two narrative perspectives are main, that of the third-person omniscient and of the third person limited, and there is also a perspective of the first-person. The novel’s narrators shift constantly and most of the times without notifying at all, and these narratives of limited perspectives of different characters help us understand the interiority, the sufferings and memories, of several different characters better and in their diversity.

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The character Beloved is an anomaly in the story, and is the whole crux of the plot of the story as well. Her name, or lack thereof, is allegorical and the most defining character trait that she has throughout the whole book. As a character, she is a mysterious entity who latches onto Sethe and her family who feeds off their attention, and reveals little to nothing about who she is. Besides these traits, her name leaves most readers to believe that this character is the ghost of Sethe’s unnamed baby that she murdered; as we know the baby’s headstone has the word “Beloved” written on it due to Sethe misinterpreting what the pastor said

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As the book ends Paul D returns, and finds Sethe laying down in Baby Sugg’s bed ready to die (70). Sethe cried out to Paul that she lost the most meaningful person in her life, Beloved (70). Paul D then hugged her as he told her she was the best thing to ever happen to him (70). Instead of Morrison writing about families being separated, she writes about them being sold as if they were livestock (71). Morrison chose to write about the African-American experiences during slavery (Heinze 127).

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