Spiteful, Loud, and Quiet
124 is spiteful, loud, and quiet.
The first sentence of each of Beloved's three parts has an adjective to describe 124 Bluestone rd. It is spiteful, then loud, and then quiet. As memories are re-experienced and people from the Sethe's past appear, the situation within the house evolves. With three adjectives given at three distinct sections of the story, the house's story arc is explicitly given. Hidden and unspoken spite explodes into loud roaring clamor, and eventually calms to an overwhelming quiet.
Part one's sentence---the first three words of the book---introduces the haunted, vengeful house. "Baby's venom" simmers in the air, sending chairs flying and mirrors to break. However, this baby is invisible and a ghost; whatever harm it creates is indirect to the real cause of its spite. The underground and indirect feelings stay in the background of Sethe and Denver's minds. They are not fully addressed even when Paul D tells Sethe about Halle having seen what schoolteacher's nephews did to her. Sethe says that she "didn't plan on hearing it" and wishes that she would not ask more questions. These appearances of rememory come up reluctantly for Sethe, and never in part one does she narrate the event from 18 years prior. The pain and the past are kept secret and underground, simmering into a spiteful ghost, intangible and indirect.
The transition to part two begins with Paul D learning about and confronting Sethe on what she had done and, consequentially, Sethe finding out that Paul D knows. All perspectives of the event had been from separate people: the four horsemen, Baby Suggs, Stamp Paid, and Paul D's experience of learning about it. Paul D's rememory brings the situation back to life, exploding the spiteful simmers into a roar of emotions. Unresolved feelings are brought up and Sethe is forced into explaining her actions and confronting the past. The emotions and perspectives of Sethe, Denver, and Beloved in respect to Beloved are fully expressed in the consecutive chapters, and everything is released. The loudness and clamor disrupts the tense stillness before, changing things around.
When the grief and clamor washes over, Sethe, Denver, and Beloved are left in quiet. Sethe gets weak, giving more and more to Beloved, and Denver feels pity for her, messing up the previous structure. Denver gets a new job and takes a fresh start amidst the ruins from part two and, during this new start, finds her white abolitionist boss alongside Sethe. With clear parallels to the appearance of schoolteacher 18 years ago, Sethe finds herself back in the same position. This time, she takes the external defense, attempting to kill him with the ice pick. This difference seems to be a culmination of changes made in the past few months. During the commotion, Beloved runs away and they later sell 124, starting a new chapter and ending in a peaceful, hopeful quiet.
The three story points of Beloved also represent the arc of relearning and accepting the past. There is an initial spite attached to unresolved emotions that can only be broken in painful clamor. Those barriers to the past are torn down, and you are lurched forward into the only path of honesty and confrontation. Once released, there is a quiet and honest peace---not perfect since the past cannot be erased---that can be taken into the future. Ignorance to confrontation to acceptance. Toni Morrison exceptionally addresses the issue of re-memory while laying out three distinct plot adjectives to Beloved.
Morrison, Toni. Beloved. Vintage Classics, 2007.
I never noticed how the first sentences of each part describe the house. It is quite interesting and something I wouldn't have noticed.
ReplyDeleteHi Diza, This is great attention to detail. I think this is a good example of how rereading the first parts of the book can be very enlightening after reading the rest of it. Rereading parts of the book through your post aloud me to better understand some of the little hints Morrison gave us that I did not know what to do with on the first read, but that add to the book's narrative.
ReplyDeleteThe final paragraph offers an eloquent and insightful summary of the arc of this novel, and its complex story about the past intruding on the present, and the efforts of those in the present to both grapple with that past AND live in a way that anticipates and even embraces a potentially better future. It's hard to articulate a "take on the book as a whole" with a book as complicated as this, but this post does an exceptionally good job of doing so.
ReplyDeleteIt's quite interesting how you suggest that the first words used to describe 124 reflect the tone of each part of the book. I also wonder, however, if they could be used to describe Beloved's effect on the characters, from when she first appears to when she is banished, as it seems like the events also align with the words. Great blog!
ReplyDeleteFantastic post Diza!! I would have never thought that each part word from the first sentence used to describe 124 was reflected in each part of the book. I also find the personification of 124 fascinating, especially since those adjectives seem to describe Beloved rather than the house's structure.
ReplyDeleteThis is such an interesting aspect of the book, I'm glad that you brought it up! I think it's such a well-used literary tactic by Morrison because it sets the reader up for the events to come, and characterizes the events going down in 124, bringing together the feelings of all of the characters as well as the events transpiring throughout the chapters into concise descriptions that give the reader a sense of what they're in for. This was a great post!
ReplyDeleteI think it's really interesting that you highlight the way the themes from the beginning of the story echo throughout the whole book. Interestingly, that seems to fit in thematically with the concept of the past bringing itself to life-- that even though the baby ghost is "driven out" for example, it must come back in the form of beloved to continue its torment of 124.
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