Beloved (Jessica Mercier)

Title: Beloved
Author: Toni Morrison
Publisher: Vintage Books
Pages: 322
I read what was on the summer reading list for 12th grade and saw Beloved. I looked it up online to read about it and decided it sounded like something I would like. So I decided to read it for my first outside reading book.

The book is about the horror of slavery. It follows a woman named Sethe, an escaped slave. Sethe decided to move forward from her brutal past and the years of suffering. She decides to do everything she can to give her children a life of freedom from slavery. Sethe decides to kill her young daughter, who is just two years old, to keep her out of the hands of the slave catchers. She soon is reunited with the spirit of her murdered daughter. Then her daughter returns in the flesh, with the name of Beloved. At the end they have to do an exorcism on the body of Beloved to stop her from destroying the lives surrounding her.

I truly think this book is for everyone, from young teens to adults. It touches on so many subjects from love and loss to the horrors of slavery. I don’t think a child should read this book because of some events that take place. I think this book will move anyone who reads it.

Toni Morrison used very descriptive words and dialogue to really help the readers have a sense of what is happening in the book, both mentally and physically. Morrison also used different kinds of trees in her book. She seems to mention them to show hope and relief. When reading the book, you really have a graphic picture in your mind so you can really understand the situations occurring. The story also doesn’t go from beginning to end, but from different levels from the past. "The wrists he held out for the bracelets that evening were steady as were the legs he stood on when chains were attached to the leg irons. But when they shoved him into the box dropped the cage down, his hands quit taking instruction" (107).

“Suspended between the nastiness of life and the meanness of the dead, she couldn’t get interested in leaving life or living it, let alone the fright of two creeping-off boys. Her past had been like her present—intolerable—and since she knew death was anything but forgetfulness, she used the little energy left her for pondering color.” (Morrison 3-4)This quote really made me realize how horrible Sethe’s life was. She really didn’t care whether she was dead or alive. Her past was and is still intolerable to her. I don’t know if she had a desire to live.

“Anything dead coming back to life hurts.” (Morrison 35) This quote made me really think and realize she is right. When you lose someone or something you go through grieving and hopefully in time acceptance, but if that person or thing comes back into your life it reopens the wound again and it starts hurting again.

“Daily life took as much as she had. The future was sunset; the past something to leave behind. And if it didn’t stay behind, well, you might have to stomp it out. Slave life; freed life—every day was a test and a trial. Nothing could be counted on in a world where even when you were a solution you were a problem.” (Morrison 256) This was a really sad and kind of depressing quote. No matter what Sethe did, she would never have a happy and completely free life. Being African American, she was stuck at a certain level of acceptance. This quote stuck with me because it showed how hopeless her life seemed to be and how many horrible things she has had to go through in her life.

I can’t really relate to any specific thing that happened in this book, but certain parts really stuck with me. The pure horror Sethe has to endure during her years as a slave makes you sick. It seems her live has and always will be a struggle, yet she has never lost hope. This book really touched me and I would recommend it to everyone to read.