Essay On Psychological Effects Of Trauma In Toni Morrison's Beloved
Psychological Effects of Trauma in Beloved
Toni Morrison’s novel, Beloved, embodies the painful memories and trauma that former slaves had to go through during the Reconstruction Era. Morrison tells a story of a former slave woman named Sethe that runs away from her plantation called Sweet Home, with her newborn daughter, Denver, while her other children are back with her mother-in law. Her owners are coming to look for her to take her back to the plantation. When they arrive she runs , and she kills her daughter and tries to kill the other three so they would not have to go through the pain of being a slave as she was. Sethe is shunned from her community for her heinous act and lives in a house that is haunted by her dead baby's vengeful ghost. …show more content…
Sethe tries to push the horrifying and painful memory of not only her murder of her daughter but also the memories of slavery, the things she had to witness, and those events she went through while enslaved. Sethe does not allow herself to accept her past instead chooses to keep her painful memories a secret causing her to be haunted by her own demons and keeping her from moving on and living in the present. After the terrifying things that Sethe went through as a slave and the horrifying killing she did to her daughter Sethe showed symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder. Throughout the story, Sethe learns to open up, shares her memories, and to forgive not only her owners but herself before she can finally let go and be free. Thoughtout this novel Morrison addresses several themes of painful pasts and trying presents and how the main character, Sethe, must overcome the mental traumatization of her abuse as a slave, stress of trying to be the perfect mother, and how she must forgive herself in order to move on to the future.
Sethe as a slave witnessed and endured many unimaginable and unspeakable things when she was a slave that no human being should ever have to go through. As a slave Sethe was beaten and taken advantage of and she goes through a lot of pain that she tries to push past and ignore. When Sethe was a slave she was whipped by one of her owners so severely that she has a tree shaped scar on her back. This tree that is imprinted upon her back symbolizes the memories that she can not hide from. The scars on her back show an example of the dehumanization and disfiguring that she had to go through after years of being a slave. The placement of the scars show the fact that she tries to put all her pain from the memory of being a slave and killing her daughter behind her. Even though she wanted to hide away from her memories and the pain that the tree brought along Paul D would make her remember every horrific and tragic memory she had gone through.“And he would tolerate no peace until he had gone touched every ridge and leaf of it with his mouth,none of which she could feel because her back skin had been dead for years”(Morrison.21). Paul D actually found Sethe’s story and scars to be beautiful and that she should walk with her scars proudly. Paul D showed Sethe that not all of physical marks of her painful and traumatizing history were ugly. Paul D shows even though she had been through hell in back there was still beauty to be found after the pain as explained,”he saw the sculpture on her back had become, like the decorative work of an ironsmith too passionate for display” (Morrison.21).Then Paul D would begin to kiss her scars and shows that memories from Sethe’s past are not only viewed as horrific but can be beautiful thus transforming her story of pain and oppression into one of survival and trimf.This part of Beloved is emotional for Sethe because she starts to put her trust into Paul D and stops being closed hearted. Sethe then speculates that perhaps because of Paul D’s presence she can now “feel the hurt her back ought to. Trust things and remember things because the last of the Sweet Home men was there to catch her if she sank”(Morrison.18). She now puts some of her burden onto Paul D relieving her from some of her guilt. According to academic specialist Lorie Fulton “the novel makes it painfully clear that she remembers everything, but she simply refuses to allow herself to react to those memories”(Fulton). Sethe does not allow herself to relap to the past memories that were devastating to her life she would rather cast them out of her existence. If she continues to bury herself in her own painful memories she will cause even more stress onto herself and her family.
Sethe also has a lot of built up guilt in not being able to take care of her children which is a mother's worst nightmare. Sethe tries to love and protect all of her children, which is ironic because she ends up killing one of her children for such said love. As she deals with her own mental and emotional struggles a woman comes into her life by the name of Beloved and she transforms Sethe drastically. Sethe believes that Beloved is a reincarnation of her dead daughter and Sethe tries to bond with her and finally be that mother figure she was not before. It is obvious to see that Sethe has a psychological disorder to say that her dead daughter has come back and formed herself onto another life. Sethe's psychological problems go back to the relationship of her own mother and how she claimed to have witnessed the same mark and similar body as a woman that was burned and hung right in front of her. “The horror of that event was always at the back of Sethe’s mind, and the psychological theories of the twentieth century would suggest that, for Sethe, the mother was associated with death”(Mayfield). Witnessing her mother being burned and hung was thee first signs that Sethe would end up with a psychological problem herself. Sethe does not have a mother in her life and because of this she tries her hardest to be there for all of her children and protect them no matter what. “If you can call whatever's in that mind of hers a mind, that is.” “Excuse me, but I can’t hear a word against her. I’ll chastise her. You leave her alone”. (Morrison 55). When Paul D first comes to Sethe’s house and Denver mouths back to Paul D about how long his presence will be made Paul D starts to tell Sethe that she needed to learn a lesson.
Sethe fires back at him letting Paul D for coming for her daughter even when Denver is in the wrong she will stand by them and protect them.“Sethe’s guilt has recreated Beloved and seems to be a psychological standpoint”(Mōrk). Seethes guilt and mental unstableness brought herself to conjure up a presence so that she will be able to move forward. Freud’s psychoanalysis states that “ you have to remember and recreate your past to overcome traumas”.(Freud). Sethe must bring up all of her past to confront it head on in order to overcome guilt built up within herself.
Sethe’s guilt after killing her daughter eats her inside and she does not express this nor does she open up until Beloved comes. Beloved is there ultimately to free Sethe from her burden of guilt so she may come to terms with herself. Sethe kept all of her hurtful past traumatizing history to herself because to dwell on the past was something they were not to do. Though surprisingly when beloved comes Sethe makes a strange bond and connects with her on another level that is not
understandable: “Sethe would always tell Denver broken parts of her traumatic history or give short replies because it was just not something to talk about but with Beloved, Sethe found a strange comfort and confinement in speaking to her about her past that she did not have with anyone else. “It amazes Sethe because every mention of her past life hurt. She and Baby suggs had agreed without saying so that it was unspeakable[...]Perhaps it was Beloved’s distance from the events itself, or her thirst for hearing it-- in any case it was an unexpected pleasure”(Morrison.69).
As time goes on Sethe eventually comes to a theory that Beloved is in fact her dead daughter reincarnated as her. Sethe takes this opportunity to seek forgiveness and make sure she has an understanding of why she killed her. until she is forgiven she will not have peace nor the will to move past her conflictions. This is how Beloved keeps a hold on her because Sethe does not feel like she is forgiven thus not letting go of Beloved. Sethe eventually quits her job and BEloved starts to crave more and more of Sethe until she is almost nothing. Morrison is symbolizing Sethe letting the guilt of not being the woman she was supposed to be and letting her guilt take complete control over her. Denver must save her mother from herself she goes out and gets the community to join her and push Beloved out of the house for good. Also showing the forgiveness of the community after being shunned for so long. The final step for her own forgiveness is when reminisces back to eighteen years ago and thinks Mr. Bodwin is the slave master. Instead of harming her children she runs to attack him. In that act Beloved disappears. Sethe has now fulfilled a motherly role like she was always meant to do and is now ready to let go and move on. “Beloved /You are my sister /You are my daughter/You are my face; you are me /I have found you again; you have come back to me /You are my Beloved /You are mine”(Morrison.255). Sethe has now forgiven herself for all of her past mistakes though she has not forgot. Beloved is a symbol for all of her burdens and mistakes that she had to correct. When Beloved disappears it is validation that Sethe is finally doing the morally right thing and must move on but never forget because Beloved is now apart of her inner self and her community.
Throughout the novel Morrison shows the psychological effects after a major traumatization. Sethe learns to love herself and to love her children and become the mother figure she always wanted to be for her children.Morrison arouses the readers with deep thoughts and overwhelming emotions as we read through Sethe’s journey to recovery after her traumatic past experiences. Sethe overcomes all trying obstacles in her way and becomes the person she wants to be. Sethe, Paul D, and Denver are now all living in the future and move on from the past even though it is not forgotten. Sethe learns to forgive herself for her wrongdoings. “Sethe,” he says, “me and you , we got more yesterday than anybody. We need some kind of tomorrow”(Morrison 322) . Paul D tells Sethe this so she will finally let go of her past and move to a better future with him and she does. She disremembered her past and moves on taking account for her mistakes. In the beginning Morrison tells the reader that 124 is full of spite and of a baby’s vengeance. Near the end 124 is quiet, there is an emptiness in the house and 124 is at peace. Therefore Sethe is is able to finally move on and be at peace with herself and deal with her trauma with Paul D and herself.
Toni Morrison’s novel, Beloved, embodies the painful memories and trauma that former slaves had to go through during the Reconstruction Era. Morrison tells a story of a former slave woman named Sethe that runs away from her plantation called Sweet Home, with her newborn daughter, Denver, while her other children are back with her mother-in law. Her owners are coming to look for her to take her back to the plantation. When they arrive she runs , and she kills her daughter and tries to kill the other three so they would not have to go through the pain of being a slave as she was. Sethe is shunned from her community for her heinous act and lives in a house that is haunted by her dead baby's vengeful ghost. …show more content…
Sethe tries to push the horrifying and painful memory of not only her murder of her daughter but also the memories of slavery, the things she had to witness, and those events she went through while enslaved. Sethe does not allow herself to accept her past instead chooses to keep her painful memories a secret causing her to be haunted by her own demons and keeping her from moving on and living in the present. After the terrifying things that Sethe went through as a slave and the horrifying killing she did to her daughter Sethe showed symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder. Throughout the story, Sethe learns to open up, shares her memories, and to forgive not only her owners but herself before she can finally let go and be free. Thoughtout this novel Morrison addresses several themes of painful pasts and trying presents and how the main character, Sethe, must overcome the mental traumatization of her abuse as a slave, stress of trying to be the perfect mother, and how she must forgive herself in order to move on to the future.
Sethe as a slave witnessed and endured many unimaginable and unspeakable things when she was a slave that no human being should ever have to go through. As a slave Sethe was beaten and taken advantage of and she goes through a lot of pain that she tries to push past and ignore. When Sethe was a slave she was whipped by one of her owners so severely that she has a tree shaped scar on her back. This tree that is imprinted upon her back symbolizes the memories that she can not hide from. The scars on her back show an example of the dehumanization and disfiguring that she had to go through after years of being a slave. The placement of the scars show the fact that she tries to put all her pain from the memory of being a slave and killing her daughter behind her. Even though she wanted to hide away from her memories and the pain that the tree brought along Paul D would make her remember every horrific and tragic memory she had gone through.“And he would tolerate no peace until he had gone touched every ridge and leaf of it with his mouth,none of which she could feel because her back skin had been dead for years”(Morrison.21). Paul D actually found Sethe’s story and scars to be beautiful and that she should walk with her scars proudly. Paul D showed Sethe that not all of physical marks of her painful and traumatizing history were ugly. Paul D shows even though she had been through hell in back there was still beauty to be found after the pain as explained,”he saw the sculpture on her back had become, like the decorative work of an ironsmith too passionate for display” (Morrison.21).Then Paul D would begin to kiss her scars and shows that memories from Sethe’s past are not only viewed as horrific but can be beautiful thus transforming her story of pain and oppression into one of survival and trimf.This part of Beloved is emotional for Sethe because she starts to put her trust into Paul D and stops being closed hearted. Sethe then speculates that perhaps because of Paul D’s presence she can now “feel the hurt her back ought to. Trust things and remember things because the last of the Sweet Home men was there to catch her if she sank”(Morrison.18). She now puts some of her burden onto Paul D relieving her from some of her guilt. According to academic specialist Lorie Fulton “the novel makes it painfully clear that she remembers everything, but she simply refuses to allow herself to react to those memories”(Fulton). Sethe does not allow herself to relap to the past memories that were devastating to her life she would rather cast them out of her existence. If she continues to bury herself in her own painful memories she will cause even more stress onto herself and her family.
Sethe also has a lot of built up guilt in not being able to take care of her children which is a mother's worst nightmare. Sethe tries to love and protect all of her children, which is ironic because she ends up killing one of her children for such said love. As she deals with her own mental and emotional struggles a woman comes into her life by the name of Beloved and she transforms Sethe drastically. Sethe believes that Beloved is a reincarnation of her dead daughter and Sethe tries to bond with her and finally be that mother figure she was not before. It is obvious to see that Sethe has a psychological disorder to say that her dead daughter has come back and formed herself onto another life. Sethe's psychological problems go back to the relationship of her own mother and how she claimed to have witnessed the same mark and similar body as a woman that was burned and hung right in front of her. “The horror of that event was always at the back of Sethe’s mind, and the psychological theories of the twentieth century would suggest that, for Sethe, the mother was associated with death”(Mayfield). Witnessing her mother being burned and hung was thee first signs that Sethe would end up with a psychological problem herself. Sethe does not have a mother in her life and because of this she tries her hardest to be there for all of her children and protect them no matter what. “If you can call whatever's in that mind of hers a mind, that is.” “Excuse me, but I can’t hear a word against her. I’ll chastise her. You leave her alone”. (Morrison 55). When Paul D first comes to Sethe’s house and Denver mouths back to Paul D about how long his presence will be made Paul D starts to tell Sethe that she needed to learn a lesson.
Sethe fires back at him letting Paul D for coming for her daughter even when Denver is in the wrong she will stand by them and protect them.“Sethe’s guilt has recreated Beloved and seems to be a psychological standpoint”(Mōrk). Seethes guilt and mental unstableness brought herself to conjure up a presence so that she will be able to move forward. Freud’s psychoanalysis states that “ you have to remember and recreate your past to overcome traumas”.(Freud). Sethe must bring up all of her past to confront it head on in order to overcome guilt built up within herself.
Sethe’s guilt after killing her daughter eats her inside and she does not express this nor does she open up until Beloved comes. Beloved is there ultimately to free Sethe from her burden of guilt so she may come to terms with herself. Sethe kept all of her hurtful past traumatizing history to herself because to dwell on the past was something they were not to do. Though surprisingly when beloved comes Sethe makes a strange bond and connects with her on another level that is not
understandable: “Sethe would always tell Denver broken parts of her traumatic history or give short replies because it was just not something to talk about but with Beloved, Sethe found a strange comfort and confinement in speaking to her about her past that she did not have with anyone else. “It amazes Sethe because every mention of her past life hurt. She and Baby suggs had agreed without saying so that it was unspeakable[...]Perhaps it was Beloved’s distance from the events itself, or her thirst for hearing it-- in any case it was an unexpected pleasure”(Morrison.69).
As time goes on Sethe eventually comes to a theory that Beloved is in fact her dead daughter reincarnated as her. Sethe takes this opportunity to seek forgiveness and make sure she has an understanding of why she killed her. until she is forgiven she will not have peace nor the will to move past her conflictions. This is how Beloved keeps a hold on her because Sethe does not feel like she is forgiven thus not letting go of Beloved. Sethe eventually quits her job and BEloved starts to crave more and more of Sethe until she is almost nothing. Morrison is symbolizing Sethe letting the guilt of not being the woman she was supposed to be and letting her guilt take complete control over her. Denver must save her mother from herself she goes out and gets the community to join her and push Beloved out of the house for good. Also showing the forgiveness of the community after being shunned for so long. The final step for her own forgiveness is when reminisces back to eighteen years ago and thinks Mr. Bodwin is the slave master. Instead of harming her children she runs to attack him. In that act Beloved disappears. Sethe has now fulfilled a motherly role like she was always meant to do and is now ready to let go and move on. “Beloved /You are my sister /You are my daughter/You are my face; you are me /I have found you again; you have come back to me /You are my Beloved /You are mine”(Morrison.255). Sethe has now forgiven herself for all of her past mistakes though she has not forgot. Beloved is a symbol for all of her burdens and mistakes that she had to correct. When Beloved disappears it is validation that Sethe is finally doing the morally right thing and must move on but never forget because Beloved is now apart of her inner self and her community.
Throughout the novel Morrison shows the psychological effects after a major traumatization. Sethe learns to love herself and to love her children and become the mother figure she always wanted to be for her children.Morrison arouses the readers with deep thoughts and overwhelming emotions as we read through Sethe’s journey to recovery after her traumatic past experiences. Sethe overcomes all trying obstacles in her way and becomes the person she wants to be. Sethe, Paul D, and Denver are now all living in the future and move on from the past even though it is not forgotten. Sethe learns to forgive herself for her wrongdoings. “Sethe,” he says, “me and you , we got more yesterday than anybody. We need some kind of tomorrow”(Morrison 322) . Paul D tells Sethe this so she will finally let go of her past and move to a better future with him and she does. She disremembered her past and moves on taking account for her mistakes. In the beginning Morrison tells the reader that 124 is full of spite and of a baby’s vengeance. Near the end 124 is quiet, there is an emptiness in the house and 124 is at peace. Therefore Sethe is is able to finally move on and be at peace with herself and deal with her trauma with Paul D and herself.