Beloved

Toni Morrison

Beloved is based on a true story about a woman who tried to kill all her children to keep them from the horrors of slavery. One of them, the baby, died. In retelling the tale, Morrison gathers dis-membered branches and fallen be-leafs from the foot of the tree of humanity–parts that were severed by American slavery. She revisits the moments of dismemberment of the slave’s sense of self and the slaver’s separation from conscience.

American slavery was one of the cruelest scars in history. Knowledge of the horrors endured (and un-endured) is essential to healing parts of ourselves that are seemingly held together by the speed at which we run away from the memory. Beloved re-minds us of that terrible time that won’t heal unless it is faced squarely. We are forced to take our time with this book.  Toni Morrison dis-members the heroine’s story (in the same way that the slave’s self was fractured). There are gaps in the storyline: horrifying holes like open graves in the road (out of which cruel realities flower). Most of the bridges of reason are out (except the ones made of the reader’s compassion). The cruelty seems unbelievable (except that in American slavery, cruelty was common and compassion was the exception).

Only with trust do the puzzle pieces of the self put themselves together along “fault lines” of character.  As the puzzle pieces connect, the reader has to choose between focusing on the “fault lines” or the beauty she paints of the landscape of the slaves’ higher consciousness.

At these junctions, and their disappearance, lay the many miracles of this love story that is considered to be the best American novel of the Twentieth Century. Toni Morrison received the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for Beloved and the Nobel Prize for Literature among many other major awards.

Cloth 29.95

Paper 15.00