Archetypes In Toni Morrison's Beloved
Beloved Paper A myth is simply a way for humans to orient themselves in the world. Why did Sethe kill her own daughter and not think twice before doing it? What made that thought even cross her mind, an action that took her daughter away from her forever? It may be hard to understand this from ones point of view. Toni Morrison, in the novel Beloved, uses the character Beloved to function as a mythic archetype in the society to help the reader understand things and answer complex questions in the book, like Sethe’s actions and why she did what she did. Archetypes represent universal patterns of human nature. In Beloved, the character Beloved is the anima; she is a projection of the other characters’ desires. To Sethe, Beloved comes to her
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Not even former slaves that lived near her and went through similar situations. All the people in town ignored Sethe after this and acted as if she didn’t exist anymore. For example, Ella, one of Sethes old friends says, “I ain’t got no friends take a handsaw to their own children” (Morrison 221). They thought she was crazy. So a person reading this book who didn’t go through anything similar to Sethe’s experience will have a hard time understanding what and why Sethe did too. So Beloved helps get this through to the reader. Beloved returns, and once Sethe realizes it is her daughter, she goes all out to try to make it up to her. “And instead of looking for another job, Sethe played all the harder with Beloved: lullabies, new stitches, the bottom of the cake bowl, the top of the milk. If the hen had only two eggs, she got both” (Morrison 282). This shows how Sethe did love her daughter. She still loves her, and it also shows that the reason behind killing her was only out of fear and love. Sethe was a slave for most of her life and she knows what it is like. There was no way she would want her own children to have to go through …show more content…
Beloveds aim is to wake Sethe up to her surroundings; to show her that everything is not ok and that all those miserable years of being a slave cannot just simply be forgotten. “Sethe was trying to make up for the handsaw; Beloved was making her pay for it” (Morrison 295). Even though Sethe saw Beloved’s return as something good and as a way to lift the weight of her past off her shoulders, Beloved had a reason for being there. She wanted to send the message to Sethe that a trauma in a person’s life will follow them forever. It was as if Sethe was knocked back to reality. Beloved is Sethe’s reminder- her reminder of what she did and how slavery will still have an effect on her even though she ran away and she is “free”, and no matter how hard she tries to forget. “It took longer for those who had spoken to her, lived with her, fallen in love with her, to forget, until they realized they couldn’t remember or repeat a single thing she said, and began to believe that, other than what they themselves were thinking, she hadn’t said anything at all” (Morrison 324). Once Beloved is gone, and the way the past returns to Sethe, all the memories and the trauma, Sethe finally realizes the truth. She was very negatively impacted by slavery, and its effects on her, she finally sees, will never go away. That trauma will carry on with her, no matter what she tries to do to forget it. Having Beloved by her
Not even former slaves that lived near her and went through similar situations. All the people in town ignored Sethe after this and acted as if she didn’t exist anymore. For example, Ella, one of Sethes old friends says, “I ain’t got no friends take a handsaw to their own children” (Morrison 221). They thought she was crazy. So a person reading this book who didn’t go through anything similar to Sethe’s experience will have a hard time understanding what and why Sethe did too. So Beloved helps get this through to the reader. Beloved returns, and once Sethe realizes it is her daughter, she goes all out to try to make it up to her. “And instead of looking for another job, Sethe played all the harder with Beloved: lullabies, new stitches, the bottom of the cake bowl, the top of the milk. If the hen had only two eggs, she got both” (Morrison 282). This shows how Sethe did love her daughter. She still loves her, and it also shows that the reason behind killing her was only out of fear and love. Sethe was a slave for most of her life and she knows what it is like. There was no way she would want her own children to have to go through …show more content…
Beloveds aim is to wake Sethe up to her surroundings; to show her that everything is not ok and that all those miserable years of being a slave cannot just simply be forgotten. “Sethe was trying to make up for the handsaw; Beloved was making her pay for it” (Morrison 295). Even though Sethe saw Beloved’s return as something good and as a way to lift the weight of her past off her shoulders, Beloved had a reason for being there. She wanted to send the message to Sethe that a trauma in a person’s life will follow them forever. It was as if Sethe was knocked back to reality. Beloved is Sethe’s reminder- her reminder of what she did and how slavery will still have an effect on her even though she ran away and she is “free”, and no matter how hard she tries to forget. “It took longer for those who had spoken to her, lived with her, fallen in love with her, to forget, until they realized they couldn’t remember or repeat a single thing she said, and began to believe that, other than what they themselves were thinking, she hadn’t said anything at all” (Morrison 324). Once Beloved is gone, and the way the past returns to Sethe, all the memories and the trauma, Sethe finally realizes the truth. She was very negatively impacted by slavery, and its effects on her, she finally sees, will never go away. That trauma will carry on with her, no matter what she tries to do to forget it. Having Beloved by her