The Sacrifice a Mother Would Make for Her Child in Beloved by Toni Morrison

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Toni Morrison novel, Beloved originated from a nineteenth-century newspaper article that she read while doing research in 1974. The article was about a runaway slave named Margaret Garner, who had run away with her four small children sometime in 1856 from a plantation in Kentucky. She traveled the Underground Railroad, to Ohio, where she lived with her mother-in-law. When her Kentucky owner arrived in Ohio to take Margaret and the four children back to the plantation, she tried to murder her children and herself. She managed to kill her two year-old daughter and severely injure the remaining three children before she was arrested and jailed.
Toni saw this opportunity to write this particular article into a novel to show people how the days of slavery were and the sacrifices those that had run away would make if they stood a chance to be recaptured. The novel also introduces us to the spirits of the souls that were lost and how they never rested in peace until they finished what they had left behind. Toni really captures the audience’s attention in this particular novel.
Therefore, although this story may seem facetious, it is really based on an article that Toni Morrison found in nineteen hundred and seventy-four. The whole story line keeps your mind involved in what is going on and how this particular family overcomes their struggles.
Sethe is the main character in Toni Morrison’s award winning novel Beloved. She was a former slave whom ran away from her plantation, Sweet Home, in Kentucky eighteen years ago. She and her daughter moved to Cincinnati, Ohio to live with her mother-in-law Baby Suggs. Baby Suggs passed away from depression no sooner than Sethe’s sons, Howard and Buglar ran away by the age of thirteen. Sethe tries...

... middle of paper ...

...get the evil spirit out of the home quickly.
Beloved, she was exactly as her name. A spirit that came and left just like the wind. Although she caused a lot of broken hearts and pain. She never meant to hurt anyone, she just wanted rest and the only way to receive that rest was by revisiting the woman that caused her pain and murdered her.

Works Cited

Deck, Alice A. "Beloved: Overview." Reference Guide to American Literature. Ed. Jim Kamp. 3rd ed. Detroit: St. James Press, 1994. Literature Resource Center. Web. 5 May 2014
Fulton, Lorie Watkins. "Hiding fire and brimstone in lacy groves: the twinned trees of Beloved." African American Review 39.1-2 (2005): 189+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 5 May 2014.
Morrison, Toni. Beloved: a novel. : , . Print.
SparkNotes. SparkNotes, n.d. Web. 5 May 2014. .

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