How Does Toni Morrison Use Trees In Beloved

Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved is one of many of her works that expose the mistreatment of Blacks in the United States. Growing up in a life of segregation herself, Morrison chooses to circulate her novels to give voice to African American citizens that could not speak up against their own rights during the Jim Crow Era. Morrison has developed a sense of understanding for why racial discrimination occurs, and she does not agree with it, just like any other African American citizen. Her goal of writing is to redirect and reshape the racial standards of society. Set in the 19th century, her novel Beloved is a vivid textual representation of slavery, discrimination, and deprivation. Throughout her novel, Morrison often includes different images of trees, both in positive and negative manners. These different examples of trees give room for different interpretations and understandings, but ultimately, it is evident that throughout the novel,

Morrison incorporates this effectively to demonstrate a binary between Sethe and Paul D. Throughout the novel, Toni Morrison depicts Sethe as a character who is very hurt and vulnerable. Much like her mother, Sethe was forced into a life of slavery and discrimination due to the time period. She is known to repress her thoughts and feelings in order to hide her haunting and scarring past events. In almost every chapter, it is evident that Morrison incorporates a tree in order to highlight slavery and destruction among Sethe’s life. For example, the novel states, “"Not a tree, as she said. Maybe shaped like one, but nothing like any tree he knew because trees were inviting; things you could trust and be near; talk to if you wanted to” (Morrison 26). Morrison purposefully includes this in order to demonstrate the weakness behind Paul D’s perspective among Sethe’s back. Not only does Sethe not necessarily understand the true visual aspect of her back, but by stating that it is uninviting, he