The Anonymous Narrator

The primary narrator in the “Beloved” is unknown for the readers. The narrator is not physically present in the story, but the narrator has access to everything. So I would say the narrator of “Beloved” is anonymous and omniscient. The anonymous narrator has narrated the story in the third person. The anonymous narrator does not only narrate the story but also the story is the collective narration of flashback of the characters. So when the characters express their feelings and look back into their memory, they use the first person.

The narrator has narrated the story with lots of detail information. In other words, the story gives the readers detail picture of everything that is taking place in the story whether it is the conversation between the characters, feelings of the character or the description of a scenario. “Kneeling in the keeping room where she usually went to talk-think it was clear why Baby Suggs was so starved for color. There wasn’t any except for two orange squares in a quilt that made the absence shout. The walls of the room were slate-colored, the floor earth-brown, the wooden dresser the color of itself, curtains white, and the dominating feature, the quilt over an iron cot, was made up of scraps of blue serge, black, brown and gray wool-the full range of the dark and the muted that thrift and modesty allowed.”(Page 38) In the above paragraph from the story, the description of a room is written using very detail information such as the colors, the position, features and so on. Narrating the story in such a detail way makes the readers as if they are the part of the story and the readers are actually witnessing the scenario.

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