Term Project Important Sources: Beloved Study Guide

Andres, William L., and Nellie Y. McKay, eds.  Toni Morrison's Beloved:  A           Casebook.  New York:  Oxford University Press, 1999.

So far I've read the chapter titled "Margaret Garner and Seven Others," which details the events leading up to and following the murder of a slave child by her mother Margaret Garner, which Toni Morrison's novel Beloved is based on. Garner, her husband Simon Jr., their four children, and Simon's parents escaped from slavery on Sunday, January 27th, 1856. They were found in a house in Ohio and, after the slaves refused to surrender, a battle ensued. The runaway slaves were overcome by marshals who found a "nearly white child, bleeding to death" (26). May writes, "the mother of the children... said that she had killed one and would like to kill the three others, rather than see them again reduced to slavery" (26). May describes the accounts that followed, including all of the legal proceedings and accounts as recorded by various newspaper articles, court transcripts, and even extracts from religious sermons relating to the events.

The details presented in this chapter are remarkable and it is a very useful resource for the Beloved Study Guide, as background information.  It's easy to understand why this incident inspired Morrison to write Beloved.  It evokes many questions; such as, how could a mother do such a thing to her child?  What would it feel like to be a slave and a mother, knowing that your children can be sold away from you?  What would it be like being a daughter who never knew her mother.  Beloved in one woman's response to those questions.

Bloom, Harold, ed.  Modern Critical Interpretations:  Beloved.  Philadelphia:            Chelsea House Publishers, 1999.

This book is a collection of critical evaluations of Beloved. It includes papers written by fourteen different scholars.  In his introduction, Bloom writes about the power of the novel Beloved.  He says, "Of all Morrison's novels, it puzzles me most" (1).  Bloom is fascinated by the characters in Beloved, which he describes as "ideograms" (1). 

Since my time is limited, I've decided to narrowed my readings down to the following works:  "Haunted by Their Nightmares" by Margaret Atwood, "A Different Remembering:  Memory, History and Meaning in Toni Morrison's Beloved" by Marilyn Sanders Mobley, and "Maternal Bonds as Devoureres of Women's Individuation in Toni Morrison's Beloved" by Stephanie A. Demetrakopoulos.  These chapters all appear to be directly related to the focus I've chosen for the Online Beloved Study Guide.

Morrison, Toni.  Beloved.  New York:  Plume, 1998.

Beloved is a novel about an ex-slave, Sethe, who had to confront her past.  She killed a daughter, rather than have her taken back into slavery.  There are many themes in Morrison's novel.  The theme that millions upon millions of people died when they were kidnapped in Africa, died when they were transported, like cargo, across the Middle Passage, died in the institution of slavery, and died at the hands of white bigots even after slavery was abolished.  Another theme addresses the issue of what it means to be a human being, and how it feels to be treated like an animal.  There is also the theme of family, particularly how mother's adapted (or didn't adapt to) the fact that their children could be sold away from them, and children had to try to survive not having the most important relationship--the mother/child relationship.

The novel Beloved is amazing.  Morrison is a master at prose.  I find it extremely difficult to select key passages for evaluation because the entire novel is a key passage.  Every phrase, every word is poignant and profound.  It is easy to understand why so many scholars and critics have written papers and books on Beloved.  It has not been difficult to find sources.

Peterson, Nancy J.  "Chapter Three:  Toni Morrison and the Desire for a Genuine Black History Book."  Against Amnesia:  Contemporary Women Writers and the Crises of Historical Memory.  Philadelphis:  University of Pensylvania Press, 2001.  51-97.

 Should not African Americans be allowed to show their representation of history using their own mythology or written evidence?

Timeline part one: from five million years ago (Fossils, rocks, ancient skeletal remains) Can we generalize about a continent with such diverse cultures?

Part two: African empires; Rome’s influence and its conversion to Christianity of Africa. To 1492 when Askia Muhammad brought back the tradition of Islamic learning.

Bois, Danuta.  "Toni Morrison."  1996. Distinguished Women of Past and Present. 2 May 2002 <http://www.netsrq.com/~dbois/morrison.html>
20 May 2002
<http://www.distinguishedwomen.com/biographies/morrison.html <http://www.distinguishedwomen.com/biographies/morrison.html> >

Web based on background information about Toni Morrison.

She was the first black woman to receive the Nobel Prize in literature

Her parents moved to Ohio from the south to escape racism and to find better opportunities in the north.

She was the only black student in her first grade class and the only child in the class that could read

Her major while attending Howard University in Washington D.C. was English

Her novel The Bluest Eye” began as a quick jotting down of a short story for a small writers group she joined at Howard.

Koolish, Lynda. "To Be Loved and Cry Shame: A Psychological Reading of Toni Morrison's Beloved." MELUS: [Special Issue] African American Literature 26.4 (2001). 169-195.

The author discusses the idea that Beloved is a story of the struggles for, "psychic wholeness," of the characters.

Beloved herself seems to represent the disassociated self of each character that is shown to come in contact with her.

In order for each character to achieve mental wellness they must, "access painful memories."

Denver's deaf muteness is an example of her losing touch with herself. "Made me have to read faces and learn how to figure out what people were thinking, so I didn't need to hear what they said" (206).

Sethe is used as an example of the characters mental instability when she experiences, "disrupted chronology common to persons so severely abused that they suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder…" (Koolish p. 170).

Paul D is "determined to love small and suffers enormously for the consequences of his decision" (Koolish p. 170).

According to the author, "To achieve psychic wholeness, each character must come to accept his or her memories" (174).

"Beloved is the part of Sethe whose job it is to be a witness to her own pain, to ancestral pain, to Middle Passage" (178).


May, Samuel J.  "Margaret Garner and Seven Others."  Toni Morrison's Beloved:  A Casebook.  Eds. William L. Andrews and Nellie Y. McKay.  New York:  Oxford U.P., 1999.  25-36

One deputy was wounded by gunfire during the capture. “A bullet struck a man named John Paterson, one of the Marshal’s deputies; tearing off a finger of his right hand, ad dislocated several of his teeth.”

The woman avowed herself the mother of the children, and said that she had killed one and would like to kill the three others, rather than see them again reduced to slavery?

Margaret is a dark mulatto.

The term the slaves is used often rather than mentioning the names of the slaves which seems to de-humanize them.

The mulatto term used again. “The Cincinnati Commercial of January 30, said:-- The mother is of an interesting appearance, a mulatto of considerable intelligence of manner, and with good address.

As the case proceeded, “The slaves declared they would go dancing to the gallows rather than to be sent back into slavery.”

5 best sources Eng 339

Drum roll please:

#1 Shafer, Brian. Understanding Kazuo Ishiguro. University of South Carolina Press. Columbia: South Carolina. 1998. (1-37).

This novel begins with an introductory section aimed at the commonalities in Ishiguro novels. This book then goes way in-depth on each of Ishiguro’s first four novels and their common first person narrative structures and focus on remembrance and guilt. It applies mythical analysis with the River Styx and Freudian with the S & M relationship of Sachiko and Mariko.

#2  Richie, Donald. The Films of Akira Kurosawa. University of California Press. London. 1996. (224-226).

            This text covers Kurosawa’s complete filmography and provides detailed information on cast, story lines, and analysis. Some of the earlier, more renowned films have longer treatments, but each film is treated well.

#3  Wong, Cynthia. “The shame of Memory: Blanchot’s Self-Dispossession in Ishiguro’s A Pale View of Hills”. CLIO. 24:2. 1995. 127-145.

            This essay is very detailed in its psychological analysis and uses many sources that are difficult to read, but provide useful insights.

#4        Mason, Gregory. An Interview With Kazuo Ishiguro. Contemporary Literature. 30:3. Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System. 1989.

            This is the interview in which Ishiguro comes right out and discuses the mysterious bridge scene in which Etsuko appears to slip in her narrative by slipping into the first person. He also directly discuses the first person narrators found in each of his first three novels.

#5            Bernstein, Matthew and Mark Ravina. American Historical Review. Film Reviews. Rhapsody in August. October 1993. (1161-63).

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