Beloved
Beloved is a ghost story, the tale of the dead returned to haunt the living. The story comes complete with a haunted house, strange lights, scents and sounds, and an animal that can sense the presence of the supernatural. We know of the shattering mirrors, the tiny handprints appearing in the cake, the kettleful of chickpeas on the floor, "the outrageous behavior of that place . . . turned-over slop jars, smacks on the behind, and gusts of sour air" (3,4). The ghost has uncanny strength, otherworldly features, mysterious knowledge and unexplainable powers. Women in this novel are acutely attuned to the spirit world, and they take for granted the principles that spiritualism found so "new" and appealing. Sethe and Denver live intimately with the spirit of the dead, "For they understood the source of the outrage as well as they knew the source of light," and Sethe herself asserts that "nothing ever dies" (4, 36). We are told that Denver even finds the presence of the ghost comforting (37). The women themselves, in this novel, act as mediums, interacting directly with the supernatural realm: "Sethe and Denver decided to end the persecution by calling forth the ghost that tried them so. Perhaps a conversation, they thought, a
Significantly, as Carol Schmudde points out, the sight of this haunting is located between the Ohio River, which marks the boundary between slave and free territory, and a stream marking "the watery boundary African myth places between the worlds of the living and the dead" (410). It is this thin line between realities that Morrison so adeptly confronts. In accordance with African belief about the dead, the ghost of Beloved is linked to the collective history of slavery, and to the memories of the dead and the survivors. As Baby Suggs recognizes, "death was anything but forgetfulness" (4). We know that in the world of the novel, as in the American historical landscape, slavery has left its ugly mark on both the dead and the living: "Not a house in the country ain't packed to its rafters with some dead Negro's grief," says Baby Suggs. "We lucky this ghost is a baby. My husband's spirit was to come back in here? or yours? . . . You lucky. You got three left. Three pulling at your skirts and just one raising hell from the other side" (5). Morison's version of the 19th century novel recontextualizes the tenets on which spiritualism was based, returning to Black Americans, and to women in particular, an African foundation of tradition and belief. She re-writes the slave narrative and the 19th century women's abolitionist novel, which frequently contained ghostly hauntings and other elements of spiritualism. During slavery, as these texts often depicted, the ghost story and other tales of supernatural activity were used by masters to frighten and control slaves, to prevent them from wandering about freely (Smith-Wright 142). Anglo slave owners exploited the African connection to and awareness of the power of the spirit world. Morrison's novel re-endows African-Americans with an empowering, as opposed to a controlling and demeaning, connection to this spirituality. Sethe and Denver struggle alone, and on their own terms, with very real ghosts -- the dead baby, the pain of slavery and loss, the collective memory of millions of dead Africans. They negotiate their own communication and their own peace with the realm of the dead, and ultimately discover anew the spiritual memory of power from an African past. We see this strength of spiritual negoriation most vividly when the women of Sethe's community join together to confront the spirit world head-on, with power and efficacy. I argue that Morrison designates this spiritual power particularly to women in the novel -- After all, we know that de
Some common words found in the essay are:
Beloved Morrison, Baby Suggs, Sethe Denver, African American, Bluestone Road, , Black Americans, Toni Morrison, Ohio River, Paul D's, 19th century, spirit world, sethe denver, collective history, anglo women, african belief, baby suggs, beloved spirit, ghost beloved, women 19th century, women novel,
Approximate Word count = 1700
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)
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