Beloved

Rating:
Summary: Like pulling teeth
Review: "Beloved" is a book that has garnered many accolades from both the press and my book-loving friends. Save your time! This story is so disjointed and obtuse that making sense of it will give you a headache. Paul D. is the only believable character in the story, but he seems a mere afterthought until the metaphors are finally played out. This is a Pulitzer prize winner

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Summary: Beloved: sister,daughter,ghost, slave, and--maybe--forgiver.
Review: I can almost see Toni Morrison, once she has a character in mind, asking herself, "What else can she be? How many things can she represent--things which will represent that which must be told, yet be in conflict with each other." Does Toni Morrison hold points of conjuncture of race, class, and gender in balance? No. Nothing is ever in balance. It is the constant imbalance between and within her characters caused by slavery and the memory of slavery that is the essence of Beloved. As examples, I will focus on one character: the title character Beloved. Beloved is several things. When Paul D asks Denver, "You think she sure 'nough your sister?", Denver replies, "At times. At times I think she was--more." She was a heck of a lot more. Yes, she was Denver's sister, the child Sethe killed, just as the real life Margaret Garner killed one of her children to keep her from slavery. As that child, at first an unseen and unnamed spirit, later as the bodily Beloved, she is the one and only appropriate judge for Sethe--the only one who can not only judge, but forgive. She is also, apparantly, a real person--a young woman who has survived the horrors of a slave ship. Her spotty recollections of being among bodies and death and of maybe being a sex captive are evidence of this. Beloved also is the ghost of slavery that haunts history and our consciousness--not blacks alone, but also whites. The repression of this memory causes psychosis in not only those who were slaves or who owned slaves, but also those who think about slavery, who have extreme opinions of it, who feel or felt demeaned by it, or empowered by it. This repression allows a human to rationalize animal attributes to another human and thereby justify inhuman treatment. This repression allows one who is or was a slave to survive, but in a way which does not permit a valid existence. It causes a lack of self-esteem and, perversely, guilt feelings. Beloved: daughter/sister, judge, middle passage survivor, and ghost of slavery. Who could ask for more conjuncture than that? The story does does not end on page 275; it only pauses. The ghost of slavery still haunts. Morrison tells us that "blackpeople" must face the ghost together, as a community, in order to make her go away. She tells us, both black and white, to dig out and look at the historical truth and thereby end our repression which allows the tragedy to continue. Sethe's child had no name, but the ghost has two names: predjudice and ignorance. [e-mail]

Rating:
Summary: Morrison doesn't miss on this one!
Review: This book just blew my mind. It tells how life was for slaves and former slaver in the United States. This book will definitely bring up emotions from deep inside the toughest character. This is the story of a family and their past. This is a strong learning experience.

Stop what you are doing and read this one.

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Summary: Magnificient poetic imagery.
Review: Luis Borges can be too scholastic for some, Kafka can be too grim and Garcia Marquez too magical. This is indeed one of the few books that I won't hesitate to recommend to any individual independent of his/her personal preferences in reading. After reading `Beloved', almost three years ago, I felt compelled to read all of Toni Morrioson's other works, but I rate this one the best. It also won her the Pulitzer prize in 1988.

I remember reading `Roots' by Alex Haley, the torments and the frustrations of African Americans; he had searched the roots back to the slave trade and the atrocities committed hence. I feel equally enraged when I read Rohinton Mistry write about the inhumanity of an Indian to Indian in `A Fine Balance'. Toni Morrison on the other hand doesn't write about the beaten and the downtrodden or about the plight of her people. She writes about the sensuous women and their loving men, the lovemakings, the songs, the birth pangs and death agonies. What is the most commendable is her ability to write without hate and without preaching.

What makes `Beloved' supreme is that the imagery presented in the book is almost poetic. For instance, Sethe's whipped back is described as a chokecherry tree complete with trunk, branches and tiny chokecherry leaves. The narration is non linear and yet she handles the threads masterfully without leaving the reader perplexed. The style borders on magic realism without being bizzare. If she had written nothing but this one book, I would still undoubtedly consider her the best living American novel writer.

Rating:
Summary: Haunting and Unforgettable
Review: Once in a blue moon you find a read that penetrates to avisceral level as Toni Morrison's "Beloved" does. Yourheart will never be the same after this hauntingly beautiful book takes up residence in that place for special feelings. This is one of the most poetically written pieces of literature I have ever had the honor to experience. You've got to read this one.

Rating:
Summary: a book you will never forget
Review: Why I read this book, I am not sure. It took a great sense of wonder to read and finish to the end. To wonder about the person who could endure writing such a book increased its enormous value,You knew she told a terrible truth. Maybe the most important book ever writen about how life was for blacks in america.It fuels the desire to never forget BELOVED and to do what you can to reduce or irradicate abuse of any kind to other human beings.

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Summary: "I am Beloved and she is mine."
Review: Something restive and irredeemable haunts the house known as 124. The spirit of Seth Sugg's dead baby girl, whose name is forgotten, but who is called Beloved, rives the house and its inhabitants. Just a child of two years when she was murdered, Beloved is at turns willful and fragile, petulant and loving, singular and legion.

Such also is the nature of Toni Morrison's novel, Beloved. Like its titular character, Beloved is complex, mysterious, and fantastical.

Toni Morrison's greatest achievement in Beloved is her dynamic sense of wordplay. Staccato bursts of idiomatic dialogue lack the preciousness that could have marred them. Omniscient narration is so finely and precisely crafted that the causal reader might well not notice the multitude of themes pour forth from the pages. Beloved manages greatness without have to proclaim its own importance, with the writing intelligent and accessible without falling into condescension. Through rich and varied wordplay Beloved manages the improbably: It is an undeniable modern classic that is as much at home in a university great-books curriculum as it is an engrossing who-dunnit mystery story

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Summary: I LOVE IT...A MUST READ
Review: Toni Morrison has the knack for making peole think. She's a master at exposing our hearts and minds to the real world. "Beloved" is a must read, and a must read again and again..

Rating:
Summary: Monumental
Review: Only a relatively small collection of books in American literature deserves the word "monumental" - "Moby Dick," "The Sound and the Fury," "Grapes of Wrath," are among those. I feel this visionary, intensely poetic work of art is destined to belong to that category of literature. It will linger in one's memory and "haunt" the reader for a lifetime

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Summary: Powerful look at mother-daughter relationships.
Review: In Beloved, Toni Morrison gives us a glimpse into the world of a mother pushed to the ultimate limit. The reader is given an inside seat in this fascinating drama that was based on historical events. Morrison has given us a text that will challenge you all the way. After reading this book, you feel as if you were part of the story; one that should not be forgotten. This book is a "must read" for anyone. The painful rememories of Sethe will make you want to reach out and touch her. Paul D will bring tears to your eyes. Denver is the true heroine whose innocence will steal your heart away. This book engages you from the start. You cannot help but be swept up into the turmoil and pain of the characters. One of the best books I have read!