In the essay “Variations on Grief”, author Meghan Daum losses a childhood friend unexpectedly. Brian Peterson’s passing had a seemingly small emotional effect on Daum. In fact, she doesn’t even feel the need to cry or be saddened by the sudden loss. Daum goes against the norm of how you’d think one would grieve a close friend. Instead of mourning she “decided to create an ironic occurrence rather than a tragedy” (Daum 157). She goes on with her life as if nothing happens. Daum even begins to lie about the events surrounding Brian’s death. She says that the lies are to help the Petersons cope. For instance, Daum was dishonest about Brian’s commitment to becoming a successful writer. In a way, she also lied about his death. She wouldn’t speak…
In “Beloved” by Toni Morrison, the novel follows the life of an ex-slave African American woman named Sethe, living in Ohio in the 1800s told from both third person omniscient and limited. But even more it explores sacrifices, particularly shown with Sethe. Throughout many events Sethe sacrifices continuously to benefit her children and the ones she loves.…
Beloved is placed in 1873, Cincinnati, Ohio, where Sethe is living with Denver and Baby Suggs. Just before Suggs’ death Howard and Buglar, Sethe’s 2 sons, run away due to an abusive ghost that haunted their house. Denver believes the ghost to be her dead sister and doesn’t mind it.…
Song of Solomon is a novel of finding self, but in this, one must first find a niche, a home, a family within a group of people. Morrison repeats the coincidence of belonging and finding a sense of self throughout the novel. One of the first instances of this can be seen in Milkman’s mother, Ruth. She had a niche and a comfortable sense of self with her father; however, this was overturned with his death and the complete disintegration of her marriage. With her loss of any connection, intimacy with anyone, she, too lost herself, becoming “a frail woman, content to do tiny things,” with no real life or sense of purpose because she had lost “the only person who ever really cared whether [she] lived or died” (64, 124). Pilate, on the other hand, seems to be an outlier in this novel due to her seeming wisdom, confidence, and self-assurance; however, she too needed acceptance before she could embrace herself in entirety, including her absent naval. The island people of Virginia provided this to her by showing her an ever-accepting family by “watch[ing] over her and [giving] her fewer and lighter chores as her time drew near,” despite her unusual choice not to marry the father of her child (147). Once the island people showed her such kindness and acted as her family, she was able to move on with her own, new family to satisfy that need, now that she knew how to partake in the love, strength, and acceptance necessary for life. Milkman follows her lead in the most obvious example of a sense of place and family being necessary in order to know and accept yourself. Milkman’s journey through this is far more focused on in all the steps, as in a very chronological order he went from being completely disinterested in himself, wandering aimlessly through life from one party to the next to inadvertently delving into his families past until he understood his family and where he stood in it, finally finding interest and purpose in life again. He first really admits this interest…
Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, Herman Melville’s “Benito Cereno," and Toni Morrison’s Beloved, use piety as an ironic comparison between the enslavement of Africans and early persecution of Christians to affect change in society. Conrad, Melville, and Morrison all share a common knowledge of the bible and infuse that knowledge with irony to show their audiences the issues of our society.…
The attempt at recapturing the past is important in plays, poems, and especially novels. In Toni Morrison’s Beloved, the character Sethe views the past with feelings of longing because she was a former slave who endured a tough life. Due to Sethe’s longing feelings, the theme of slavery as a destruction of one’s identity is developed in the work. Sethe is an enslaved woman in Cincinnati, Ohio who is determined to escape to freedom in the 1850’s. In order to keep her children from any trauma from Sweet Home, she attempts to murder them. She manages to kill Beloved and her two older boys run away, so she is left with Denver. Her feelings of longing come into play when Beloved shows up out of the water. Immediately, Sethe finds it strange…
Toni Morrison’s Beloved is a novel that follows the life of Sethe, an escaped slave; her mindset after slavery, and the stories of other people in her life. By using distinctive time frames, the text presents various difficulties that arise in Sweet Home, a plantation in which Sethe, Paul D, Paul A, Paul F, Sicko, Halle, and Baby Suggs are previously enslaved. The novel offers ways in which the characters deal with the repercussions of slavery. The ultimate question Toni Morrison poses to readers is: Are slaves truly free after slavery? More to the point, is physical freedom synonymous to being wholly free? Morrison consistently addresses freedom apart from the physical release from slavery. The author depicts a lack of complete freedom in…
Is it possible for a single theme to exist in the past and still live today? This question is easily answered through a movie of the past and a story of the present. In 1930, All Quiet on the Western Front was released to the public. The film was based on Erich Maria Remarque’s novel, directed by Lewis Milestone, and produced by Carl Laemmle Jr. (“All Quiet on the Western Front (1930 film)”). The present day story was written on www.usatoday.com on November 8, 2012, and is entitled: “On Veterans Day, a vet’s suicide haunts those left behind (Raasch).” Despite the time period difference and the type of media, both share the common theme of sorrow. The film and story have numerous similarities that express the theme by using events, processes, feelings, and emotions. Sorrow has stayed consistent throughout the past and present and has proved itself to be a timeless theme.…
While Toni Morrison was growing up she has also experienced prejudices similar to Twyla. Toni Morrison’s family moved to Ohio to get away from the dangers and economic struggles of the south (Kubitschek 5). As Toni Morrison grew up, she wondered what it meant to be black. She has said that when someone was born black they had to “decide to be black” (3). What Morrison said goes beyond skin color and refers to what the world views (3). This gives insight on why Morrison decided to write this short story. Both women Twyla and Roberta have preconceived views of each other based on world views. Once they build an emotional relationship with each other, they forget what the world has always told them about each other.…
The Bluest Eye, written in 1970, is novel by Toni Morrison. It is Morrison's first novel and was written while she was teaching at Howard University. The Bluest Eye tells the tragic story of Pecola Breedlove, a young black girl growing up in Morrison's hometown of Lorain, Ohio, during the hard times following the Great Depression. In this novel, Toni Morrison addresses a timeless problem of white racial dominance in the United States and points to the impact it has on the life of black females growing up in the 1930's.…
There is no love so lasting, so strong, so disinterested, so unselfish, so devoted as the first and purest of all loves, a mother’s love. In literature, the concept of a “mother’s love” exists as an important motif, frequently referred to by authors and readers alike as the most sacred of literary loves. Written nearly sixty years apart, Beloved, by Toni Morrison, and As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner, explore the motif of motherhood and a mother’s love. At their cores, Beloved and As I Lay Dying are stories about mothers and their children. Published in 1987, Morrison’s Beloved tells a heart-wrenching story of the everlasting effects of slavery in America by centering around the relationship between Sethe, an escaped slave, and the daughter…
In Ordinary People the Jarrett family is stricken with grief. There is constant tension in the air as the family goes about the day, yet each person in the family does not speak about it. They each do not have emotional security with one another. There is a serious lack of human connection in the household. Any type of therapy or conflict management would have been extremely beneficial to the family. Conrad, Beth, and Calvin each have their own way of dealing with grief. They each use unhealthy methods when dealing with the pain. Conrad is mostly silent in dealing with his trauma while Beth, his mother, is more passive-aggressive. Calvin wants the best for his family but is oblivious most of the time to Conrad’s struggles.…
Toni Morrison's unique and distinctive style helps control how the reader will respond to the characters and events within the novel. Morrison uses several different devices to control how the reader reacts to everything that is happening. Some examples of these devices are syntax (as tied with the stream of consciousness method of narration), point of view, and the use of flashback technique.…
Grief is a natural feeling to loss. Throughout our life we will all experience some form of loss whether it be the loss of a loved one to something as simple as losing your phone or your keys.…
I found Cry of the Beloved Country’s character, Theophilus Msimangu, to be my favorite of all that are presented by Alan Paton. Theophilus’ role as a bridge which connects Stephen Kumalo to the struggling city of Johannesburg from his dissimilar remote village truly interests me from a rhetorical standpoint. Msimangu is undoubtedly necessary to the building and unfolding of the story as he guides Kumalo through the streets of Johannesburg leading him from place to place. If not present, I would argue that it would be exceedingly difficult for Stephen Kumalo to find his way to his son, Absalom, let alone his sister, Gertrude, rendering the story’s continuance possibly impossible.…