The need for possession is a reoccurring theme in Beloved that gives readers an insight of the turmoil and pain experienced during the time of slavery. This theme is ironic because as a slave, the characters in the story possessed nothing, being the possession of someone else. There is a need to own something of their own even though they do not even hold possession of themselves. This can be seen in the pivotal passage in Beloved that occurred on pages 192-193 when Paul D finds out what exactly happened in 124 and what Sethe has done in the house. The story of Sethe actually begins with the killing of her own daughter in order to protect her from going back to the Sweet Home under the watch of the schoolteacher. Without this killing, there would not be a haunted house that confined both Sethe and Denver. The ultimate need for possession can be seen with Sethe’s infanticide in order to keep her children for herself.

Sethe justifies her murder by saying, “I stopped him, I took and put my babies where they’d be safe” (Morrison 2004: 193). In this pivotal quote, readers can see that Sethe went to ultimate measures to claim what is hers. She wasn’t willing to give away that claim to the schoolteacher. And now, Beloved will always be hers only, and no one else’s. Only in Sethe’s possession would her children be safe from the schoolteacher and his nephews. This was a pivotal part of the story because it’s what drives all the events that happens afterwards while also explaining the turmoil of slavery to be in possession of someone else and how this turmoil makes you want to hold on even more to that little bit that you do own.

This sort of possession and love was chastised by Paul D when he say, “your love is too thick” (Morrison 2004: 193). Toni Morrison also explains that, “suddenly he saw what Stamp Paid wanted him to see: more important than what Sethe had done was what she claimed” (Morrison 2004: 193). To claim something is dangerous in the slavery world because their claims are never forever and that is why Paul D calls it too thick. Throughout the story, we see the characters trying to claim something. They could never claim anything because they were slaves, they couldn’t even put a claim on themselves. Paul D, Denver, and Beloved wanted to claim Sethe’s love for themselves. They’ve never known what it feels to hold a claim on something and they each have this thirst to finally claim something.

Another claim that can be seen was Sethe’s continuous claim to her daughter after she has died. Sethe gave “ten minutes for seven letters” (Morrison 2004: 5). This stood out to me a lot because it is the first look at how much she loved her children. It never explicitly tells the reader what exactly this line means. But it is implied that she was willing to give the engraver ten minutes of sexual pleasure in exchange for the 7 letters of beloved to be engraved on her baby daughter’s tombstone. It brings to mind the lack of independence Africans had before and after the Civil War. Names are independent for each individual. When her daughter died, she is only referred to as beloved in the story and never by her actual birth name. I feel that beloved is a word of ownership. You have to be someone or something’s beloved. In this way, her daughter will always be hers and will always stay with her.

The possession Sethe claims of her daughter can also be seen when Paul D complains about Sethe babying Denver. When Sethe apologizes for Denver, Paul D says, “It means she has to take it if she acts up. You can’t protect her every minute. What’s going to happen when you die?” (Morrison 2004: 54). In response, Sethe says “Nothing! I’ll protect her while I’m live and I’ll protect her when I ain’t” (Morrison 2004: 54). In this quote, Sethe explains her claim to Denver and how even if Sethe can’t protect Denver physically in person, she will still be able to protect her. This passage foreshadows to Sethe’s claim to beloved and what measures she will take to protect her children. This is why she exclaims that she will protect her daughters no matter what, dead or alive.

No matter how much Sethe tried to claim what is hers, such as her children, she was still claimed by her past as a slave. Paul D says, “It occurred to him that what she wanted for her children was exactly what was missing in 124: safety” (Morrison 2004: 193). In a way, I feel that the author Toni Morrison is telling the readers that no matter how hard Sethe tried to run from the Sweet Home and cruelty of slavery, she will never be able to be a true free woman. She is still claimed and possessed by her past even though she is no longer a slave. This resonates with the readers when thinking about racism and prejudice in the world today. Even though slavery has ended and people are advocating for equality, there is a chance that it may never be achieved no matter how hard we try. Africans will always be possessed by the turmoil their ancestors must’ve felt in slavery, and probably their own turmoil of racism.

The theme of possession is a struggle that can be seen throughout the story between Sethe’s hold on her children and slavery’s hold on Sethe. Of course the beginning of this turmoil is the beginning of slavery, but when Sethe tries to kill all her children in order to put a claim on them, readers are able to understand the pain and thought process of people in the time of slavery. Infanticide can be seen as an exit to slavery, a sort of blessing or safety, for a mother. Sethe believes that death is the only escape for her children to the cruelty to slavery. This allows readers to see the negativities of slavery besides what the naked eye can see such as physical abuse. Slavery is seen as something that is worse than death, something that could affect their kin several generations down. We are still experiencing the aftermath of slavery whether it is racism or prejudices. This brings to mind the question: when will slavery’s possession on civilization ever end?

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Beloved

Project#2 –Draft

In the novel Beloved written by Toni Morrison, Sethe was the main character of the novel a former slave who escaped from the Kentucky plantation, Sweet Home, with her children to Cincinnati, Ohio where the pivotal scene of the novel occurred when her slave owner came to recapture her and her children. Sethe attempted to kill all her children, but succeed in killing one her two year old daughter, in order to prevent them taken back to Kentucky and lived as slaves.  If she did not murder her child, the whole novel would lead to a different direction.   No one would take the life of one’s own child, if there were not enough reasons to make such a tough decision and terrible act. I think the scene that Sethe’s slaying of her daughter is vital because which reflect the whole novel of before and after her action and it was also embedded with the courage and the powerful love of a mother and the cruelties of the slavery.

Sethe was the kind of mother who loves her child and wanted to give the best of her which she felt was her milk. She was very upset and angry when her owner Mrs. Gardner’s brother in law, a schoolteacher; and his two nephews took her milk just before she tried to escape from Sweet Home. She explained Paul D who also was a slave worked together with Sethe in Sweet Home came and met her in Cincinnati that, “After I left you, those boys came in there and took my milk. That’s what they came in there for. Held me down and took it” (19).  Instead of getting angry and mad for she was held down and felt the pain of the sexual assault that she received from her owner, she got angry for them for taken her milk which she thought her milk was her best and valuable things that she wanted to keep and give only to her children not others. Therefore, she repeatedly told Paul D that “And they took my milk …And they took my milk” (20).  Sethe was showing the deepest love of a mother to her child to give the best of her which  supported her action that she used her best ability to protect her children from taken back to Sweet Home and living as slaves that Sethe believe was hell.

Cruelty of the slavery did not stop for Sethe after her milk had been taken and she was beaten with the cowhide while she was pregnant with her second daughter. She told Paul D that “Schoolteacher made one open up my back and when it closed it made a tree. It grows there a still” (20). That is why she said that she had a tree on her back which actually what she meant was the scar of the wound that left after she was beaten by her owner.  She described the tree to Paul D as “A chokecherry tree. Trunk, branches, and even leaves. Tiny little chokecherry leaves. But that was eighteen years ago. Could have cherries too now for all I know” (18).  The scar on her back always reminded her of the painful experiences of being a slave and traumatized her of taken back her and her children to Sweet Home and stay as slaves again.

                One reason that Sethe killed her daughter is that she knew the painful experience of a slave and she had also enjoyed and experienced the life of freedom for twenty eight days in 124, therefore, she knew the experience of both  and  she knew which would be the best for her children.  Later she wanted to explained Beloved why she killed her (child) that

“That anybody white could take your whole self for anything that came to mind. Not just work, kill, or maim you, but dirty you. Dirty you so bad you couldn’t like yourself anymore. And though she and others lived through and got over it, she could never let it happen to her own. The best things she was, was her children. Whites might dirty her all right, but not her best thing, her beautiful, magical best thing — the part of her that was clean.” (295)

Sethe said that being a slave was not only simply about the terrible work that has to work, but can take whole self of you for whatever came up in the mind of the white. They can kill you, hurt you and dirt you. She meant” dirt “was literally rape you or invade your private part and you felt yourself as no longer clean, but she said she and other slaves lived through with it. Her children were her best things and she would not allow her children to become slaves and dirty them. That was her decision to take the clean life of her daughter to protect from dirtying which she believed was far worse than dying once.

All the painful experiences and the traumas that Sethe had in her past pushed her to make such a terrible decision and created such a cruel and vital scene of the whole novel to take the life of her own children.

Inside, two boys bled in the sawdust and dirt at the feet of a nigger woman holding a blood-soaked child to her chest with one hand and an infant by the heels in the other. She did not look at them; she simply swung the baby toward the wall planks, missed and tried to connect a second time, when out of nowhere… (175)

Sethe killed her one daughter and held her to the chest, wounded her two sons and held the baby (Denver) by the heel and swung to the wall of the woodshed.  I can imagine the hatred, courage and the love of a mother from this quote. Sethe’s  hatred of her slave owners who traumatized her in past  came to get her and her children and the courage that she showed the comer that she would kill all to prevent them from taken back to Sweet Home. She was holding one to her chest, one by heel and two lying by her feet, to protect them from taken back.

In conclusion, Sethe’s action of killing her child might not be acceptable and might be disgusting, but the love she had for her children is powerful. The later scene of the novel is occurred due to the fact of her dead daughter.  In other words, there would not be the baby ghost who haunted Sethe’s house, her two sons, Howard and Bugler would not run away. Sethe and her younger daughter Denver would not isolated in their own home and Paul D would not horrify and leave Sethe, and Sethe would not be so obsessed with Beloved who believed to be embodied spirit of Sethe’s dead daughter. That is why I think this scene is vital to the whole novel.

Work cited

Morrison, Toni.  Beloved.  New York:  Alfred  A. Knopf, 1998.  Print.

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