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A review by sidharthvardhan
Beloved by Toni Morrison
5.0
Words like Holocaust, Slavery, War etc. loose over time the terror they should inspire upon one's mind. Reminding us about what these evils feel like is one important role art plays. Toni Morrison does exactly that in this book, and in a effective way.
Past
She starts her story in the middle when slavery is already banned and biggest horrors have already passed. however this is not a happily-ever-after. In fact, for people who have been slave (or to generalize suffer miserably in anyway) for any significant period of time; it is impossible to find a perfect happiness -there will always be ghosts of past to torment; slapping the Disney idea out of park of possibilities. In this case, we actually have a real ghost of past (the Hindi word for 'ghost' and 'past' is same).
Within very fist few pages Morrison takes art's ability of creating compassion to a new level as she makes us feel that dark past within our skins in which residents of 124 live; even if, like Denvar, we are ignorant of its details. It is scary and un-ignorable, almost visible - the characters are trying not to 'look' at it, which is understandable given its darkness:
"To Sethe, the future was a matter of keeping past at bay."
We remember 'rememory' this past as Morrison brings us details in (irritatingly unannounced) flash-backs. A normal narration of events would have left readers only memories of darkest events, and we wouldn't have realised what it feels like to be a slave for all your life. The book works so brillantly because you could see the depravity felt in the smallest things and how much would those tragedies shadow any happiness that may fall in victim's way.
The past does figuritively become alive in form of Beloved, all flesh and bones. ""She reminds me of something. Something, look like, I'm supposed to remember." Although these are Paul D's words, they give experience of many people with Beloved. She was there or was a sort of metaphor of one's efforts to get over dark pasts. You can't run away from it, you need to accept it. The residents of 124 did - and they all come out of the thing better. Of course it hurt a little but Anything dead coming back to life hurts.
Slavery
How much bad do a life have to be, if a loving mother choose to kill her children rather than have them live it?
But what is slavery? It is being effectively reduced and compared to animals. It is not being allowed to love freely:
Being fueled by Morrision's prose, I could go on rambling but Baby Suggs' very first thoughts upon being freed seem to do it brillantly:
Past
She starts her story in the middle when slavery is already banned and biggest horrors have already passed. however this is not a happily-ever-after. In fact, for people who have been slave (or to generalize suffer miserably in anyway) for any significant period of time; it is impossible to find a perfect happiness -there will always be ghosts of past to torment; slapping the Disney idea out of park of possibilities. In this case, we actually have a real ghost of past (the Hindi word for 'ghost' and 'past' is same).
Within very fist few pages Morrison takes art's ability of creating compassion to a new level as she makes us feel that dark past within our skins in which residents of 124 live; even if, like Denvar, we are ignorant of its details. It is scary and un-ignorable, almost visible - the characters are trying not to 'look' at it, which is understandable given its darkness:
"To Sethe, the future was a matter of keeping past at bay."
We remember 'rememory' this past as Morrison brings us details in (irritatingly unannounced) flash-backs. A normal narration of events would have left readers only memories of darkest events, and we wouldn't have realised what it feels like to be a slave for all your life. The book works so brillantly because you could see the depravity felt in the smallest things and how much would those tragedies shadow any happiness that may fall in victim's way.
The past does figuritively become alive in form of Beloved, all flesh and bones. ""She reminds me of something. Something, look like, I'm supposed to remember." Although these are Paul D's words, they give experience of many people with Beloved. She was there or was a sort of metaphor of one's efforts to get over dark pasts. You can't run away from it, you need to accept it. The residents of 124 did - and they all come out of the thing better. Of course it hurt a little but Anything dead coming back to life hurts.
Slavery
How much bad do a life have to be, if a loving mother choose to kill her children rather than have them live it?
But what is slavery? It is being effectively reduced and compared to animals. It is not being allowed to love freely:
"Risky, thought Paul D, very risky. For a used-to-be-slave woman to love anything that much was dangerous, especially if it was her children she had settled on to love. The best thing, he knew, was to lo ve just a little bit; everything, just a little bi t, so when they broke its back, or shoved it in a croaker sack, well, maybe you'd have a little love left over for the next one."
Being fueled by Morrision's prose, I could go on rambling but Baby Suggs' very first thoughts upon being freed seem to do it brillantly:
What for? What does a sixty-odd-year-old slavewoman who walks like a three-le gged dog need freedom for? And when she steppe d foot on free ground she could not believe that Halle knew what she didn't; that Halle, who had never drawn one free breath, knew that there was nothing like it in this world. It scared her.
Something's the matter. What's the matter? What's the matter? she asked herself. She didn't know what she looked like and was not curious. But suddenly she saw her hands and thought with a clarity as simple as it was dazzling, "These hands belong to me. These my hands." Next she felt a knocking in her chest an d discovered something else new: her own heartbeat. Had it been there all along? This pounding thing? She felt like a fool and began to laugh out loud.
Mr. Garner looked over his shoulder at her with wide brown eyes and smiled himself. "What's funny, Jenny?"
She couldn't stop laughing. "My heart's beating," she said.
And it was true.