Even though this wasn’t our longest reading assignment, I feel like there was a lot that happened and there’s definitely a lot to unpack. We see a stream of consciousness/monologues from Sethe, Denver, and Beloved (plus a weird mixture of the three) and we also find out more about Paul D’s past at Sweethome as well as what he’s up to right now.
Okay so jumping straight in with Sethe’s monologue, I’ll be honest and say that my first thought when I finished reading it is that Sethe is literally freaking unhinged. I mean understandably, but still. I think part of it was because Morrison wrote it as one long paragraph that didn’t break until basically the last page, so it felt like a madman’s ramblings. I also thought it was interesting that Sethe says that she’ll “[E]xplain to her, even though I don’t have to,” (Morrison 236), referencing that she’ll explain to Beloved why she killed her even though she doesn’t owe anyone her reasoning. I found this ironic, because even so, Sethe goes on to explain herself for basically the whole rest of the chapter (aka leading her to ramble and sound CRAZY): “How if I hadn’t killed her she would have died and that is something I could not bear to happen to her,” (136), “I have felt what [slavery] felt like and nobody walking or stretched out is going to make you feel it too,” (239), “My plan was to take us all to the other side where my own ma’am is,” (240), etc. etc. you get the idea.
From all of this, I basically gathered that even though Sethe has defended herself and maintained her stance that what she did was right to Paul D, the townspeople, and even her own family, she still has some doubts. I think that although she blames the institution of slavery and the townspeople for not warning her about school tecaher’s arrival for the infanticide, she still blames herself, second-guessing her actions and even going so far as to justify them to herself.
As much as I would love to spend more time on this chapter because there are just so many things going on, I’ll move on for time’s sake and also because I have a math quiz tomorrow that I have yet to study for. That being said, let’s move on to Denver’s monologue. My biggest reaction to learning more about Denver and her perspective on her life is that I just feel so bad for her. We start off strong with, “I swallowed [Beloved’s] blood right along with my mother’s milk,” (242), which is just ew, not to mention very intense, and then we go right into how scared Denver is of Sethe. She says that “I love my mother but I know she killed one of her own daughters, and as tender as she is with me, I’m scared of her because of it,” (242). I mean that is just so terrible. Later on, I got the idea that she really only loves Sethe because she is scared of her, and is also terrified of the idea that Sethe/whatever made Sethe try and kill her will come back and make Sethe try again. Additionally, Denver constantly mentions her father and how he’s coming for her (“I always knew he was coming,” (244)), which is basically what keeps her motivated to keep living with Sethe. Knowing what we do now about Halle, this just made me feel so bad for her all over again.
Next up is Beloved’s chapter, which I have to admit was totally confusing and I really didn’t know what was going on half the time to be honest. This section also made me second-guess Beloved’s origins, though I know this ambiguity was totally purposeful on Morrison’s part. A large part of this made me think of the Middle Passage from Africa to the United States. For example, she often talks about “men without skin”, which I took to mean white men, and she also talks a lot about death, sickness, and how she is “always crouching” (248). All of this led me to think about the Middle Passage, and how even though she might be telling her own story, Morrison made it as though she is telling the story of millions of slaves as well. Additionally, the untraditional way in which this chapter was written gave me the idea that Beloved’s experience is one that cannot be conveyed justly through regular prose, and in fact goes above and beyond any sort of written word.
After this part ended and she started talking about Sethe, a woman with her face, and how she is “looking for the join” (251), I became totally lost so I would love to talk more about this section of the chapter.
After all of this, we go to chapter 23 which is also just so confusing, but I thought it was like a mix of Sethe, Denver, and Beloved’s voices (“You are my sister/You are my daughter/You are my face; you are me,” (255)). Sethe tries to comfort Beloved because she is scared the white men will come back while Denver warns Beloved not to get too attached to Sethe. Because you cannot always tell who is saying what in this chapter, it feels like their identities as people become less defined and mix together, possible representing how white people did not see slaves as their own entities but rather one collective group, or it could go along with the continues theme of how the characters in this novel often have incomplete identities and don’t really know who they truly are.
Speaking of incomplete identities, Paul D can certainly relate as is conveyed to us in chapter 24. He recalls how he didn’t know much about his family other than his two half-brothers and how “[h]e watched [families] with awe and envy, and each time he discovered large families of black people he made them identify over and over who each was, what relation, who, in fact, belonged to who,” (258). I found this interesting, because like Sethe, he has no real familial identity. This leads him to lose a fundamental component of his humanity and therefore unsure of who he is as well as his masculinity.
Finally, Stamp Paid discusses what made him choose his name and why he changed it. He had to give up his wife for his master’s son and thought it was an act so terrible that he decided all of his debts had been paid and he no longer owed anything to anyone. When his wife, Vashti, comes back to him, Stamp Paid tells Paul D that he wanted to “snap” her neck but instead decided to change his name and is reborn into a new identity free of his old life.
Okay that’s all I have (sorry that it’s literally a mile long but there was a lot) so I will leave you with some parting questions: Who is Beloved and where did she really come from? How do you feel about Sethe’s actions after hearing Sethe’s justification of it and Denver’s point of view? What do you think Paul D’s future holds for him? Will he be able to come to terms with his humanity or will this prove to be impossible?
