Beloved
Project#2 Part 2
The image is the imaginary chokecherry tree on Sethe’s back which is the scar left on her back from being whipped by the schoolteacher and his nephews after her milk had been robbed. It is part of my pivotal scene essay and it is also mentioned throughout the book the white girl Amy Denver who helped Sethe to deliver Denver on her way of escape and Sethe when she told Paul D about being whipped while she was pregnant just before her escape.
Amy said, “It is a tree, Lu. A chokecherry tree. See, here’s the trunk-it’s red and split wide open, full of sap, and this here’s the parting for the branches. You got mighty lot of branches. Leaves, too, look like, then darn if these ain’t blossoms. Tiny little cherry blossoms just as white. Your back got a whole tree on it. In bloom. What God have in mind, I wonder.” (93)
Sethe said, “That is what she called it. I’ve never seen it and never will. But that is what she said it looked like. 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).
Work Cited Page
Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998. Print.
