SHOES!

Oh my goodness! Can we talk shoes!? 

Ok - So - Baby Suggs makes shoes. There are random people's shoes in her house, and the children try them on. Beloved is wearing new black shoes when she shows it. When Sethe kills Beloved, well after, a boy shows up to drop off his shoes to be fixed. Baby Suggs dreams of those shoes, I think. Denver wears a stranger's pair of shoes when she leaves the house for the first time. And Ella says that "As long as the ghost showed out from its ghostly place - shaking stuff, crying, smashing and such - Ella respected it. But if it took flesh and came in her world, well, the SHOE was on the other foot."

Can you find other references to shoes, and tell us what the heck it could all mean?! Please!

Violence in Beloved

It is not unusual for a writer to include one or more scenes of violence in a novel.  In good literature, the violence is not gratuitous.  Using Beloved, analyze the scenes of violence that Morrison uses in her story and explain how they enhance the meaning of the work.

3's?

The structure of each of the three parts of Beloved shows a similar beginning:  “124 was spiteful;” “124 was loud;” “124 was quiet.”  Discuss the structural purpose of this repetition, the differences in focus of each part, and the purposes of this technique.

Biblical allusion?

Terry Otten, in The Crime of Innocence in the Fiction of Toni Morrison (Missouri:  University of Missouri Press, 1989, 86-87) says, “Sethe’s first willful act, the escape from the Garner estate, imitates the quest for freedom from a degenerate garden.  Sweet Home echoes again the Romantic view of a flawed Eden, where black slaves tolerated the loss of freedom because they lived in ignorance of their condition.”  Comment on this interpretation of the novel as a fall from grace and innocence in the Garden of Eden.

Abandoned daughters

Discuss this novel as a story of abandonment and loss.

Relationships in Beloved

This is a novel about relationships—maternal; marital; slave-owner to slave; abolitionist to freed slave; white to black; guard to prisoner; employer to employee.  Choose one or more relationships in the novel and analyze how each functions in the overall view of the novel.

Owning another person

Carol Iannone describes “the psychological and emotional effects of being owned—of having no sense of self, of fearing to trust or to love when anything can be taken away at any time.”  (“Toni Morrison’s Career,” Commentary 84(6), December 1987, 63).  Choose one or more characters from Beloved and analyze the psychological effects on them of being owned.

Flashback in narrative

Morrison uses a series of flashback as a dominant narrative technique in Beloved.  What is the effect of such spiral storytellings and repeated images that interweave the stories of past and present?

Historical criticism

Morrison’s work portrays many hardships and cruel atrocities that were inflicted upon black people during early American times.  Is this story designed to parallel a post-Civil War America?  If so, what do the characters represent?

Beloved's Metamorphasis

In Beloved, the main character Beloved evolves from an innocent, victimized child into a nineteen-year-old body with the same mentality, only not so innocent.  Is it merely her murder, or are there other factors that help Beloved become the monstrosity she is at the conclusion?  Are there specific characters who also contribute to this metamorphosis?  If so, when and how?

Color symbolism

In Beloved, Toni Morrison has colors play a role throughout the book.  Describe the role of each color and discuss its significance throughout the story.

Beloved's motivations

By the end of her second life, Beloved is a replica of her mother Sethe.  When dead—or in the “other place”—she even states that she “want[s] [Sethe’s] face.”  But once again among the living, she tries choking Sethe in the clearing and removed Paul D. the only basis for sanity and comfort of reason in Sethe’s life.  On one side Beloved aspires to goodness and wants to be like Sethe; on the other hand, she commits acts that are vengeful toward the mother who so quickly snuffed out her life.  With that, and her many other actions in mind, why does Beloved come back from the “other place?”  What are her motivations?

Supernatural Elements

What is the function of Beloved’s character as a ghost and of the use of the supernatural in general?

The question

Morrison has said, “[Sethe] did the right thing, but she didn’t have the right to do it.”  Comment and expand on this quotation.

Price of

Everything has its cost.  What price does Sethe pay for her actions?

Rememory

“Rememory” – used as both a noun and verb in Beloved – is one that Morrison coins for this novel.  It is richer than “remember” and suggests the opposites of “forgetfulness.”  It emphasizes the need for connection with the past and the inability to deny that connection.  Why does she create it?  What does it mean?  And in what ways is it the pivotal idea of the story?

A story to pass on

If “this is not a story to pass on,” why does Morrison choose to do exactly that – write a novel that relays the story to millions of readers?

Multiple settings

Two settings in Beloved stand out as most significant:  124 and Sweet Home.  Morrison uses these settings, both their similarities and differences, for a variety of reasons.  Briefly describe each one, discuss the similarities and differences, and analyze how they enhance the meaning of the novel.

The ending of Beloved

The conclusion of a piece of literature must be about a sense of closure and an acceptable ending to the story.  In what ways does Morrison’s novel end in a satisfactory or unsatisfactory way?

Manhood in Beloved

Paul D is plagued by thoughts of his strengths and inadequacies as a man.  Does he finally reach resolution of this conflict?  If not, why not?  If so, how?  Trace his struggles with manhood.

Finding freedom

“Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that freed self was another.”  Choose one character from Beloved and discuss the ways in which he or she achieves the goal of “claiming ownership of that freed self.”

Characterization of Sethe

Discuss the various ways in which Sethe’s appearance is described throughout the book and analyze how it reflects her changing states of mind.

Point of View and Stream of Consciousness

Throughout most of the novel, Morrison uses third-person point of view.  In several chapters in Part Two, however, she shifts to first-person and has Sethe, Denver, and Beloved speak as the narrator.  How does this stream of consciousness narrative technique affect the reader and contribute to the effectiveness of the novel?

The haunting

In David Lawrence’s article, “Fleshly Ghosts and Ghostly Flesh:  The Word and the Body in Beloved.” (Studies in American Fiction 19:2, Autumn 1991, pp. 189-202), he quotes Byron Bunch in Light in August “… that no matter how much a person might talk about how he’d like to escape from living folks…it’s the dead folks that do him the damage.”  (New York:  Vintage Books, 1987), p. 81.  Discuss this comment in relation to Morrison’s novel.

You can read the Lawrence's full article here:
Fleshly Ghost and Ghostly Flesh: The Word and Body in Beloved