A Critical Commentary on Toni Morrison's "Beloved"

            In Sheldon George’s article “Approaching the Thing of Slavery: A Lacanian Analysis of Toni Morrison’s Beloved”, he explores African American literature and the concepts that typically accompany that literature all through a Lacanian viewpoint. Lacanianism ideas gave rise to new psychoanalytic theories of humankind. One interesting idea that George discusses in this article is the role Denver plays in this novel.

            Denver is a child who has really only had one adult figure in her life, her mother Sethe. As a child she is dependent on her mother, but like any child is longing for a father figure. As Denver is caught in this stage of dependency and longing she attempts to make do with what she has. As a result she tries to understand Sethe and the choices she has made in her life. George explains that Denver is trying to cope with Sethe’s “trauma” (the time spent as a slave, and killing her child). Denver “simultaneously fears and seeks both the symbolic and the real” (125, George). Denver wants to understand the reality of what made her mother want to kill her children but is still terrified because she is still one of Sethe’s kids. The symbolic fear that Denver seems to possess comes from Sethe and her time away from 124. She thinks that whatever drove Sethe to kill her children came from away from 124 and could come back at any time. In Lacanian viewpoints, Denver is the true hero of this story. While Denver is very similar to Sethe, personality wise, she is different in the choices she has for her future. Sethe is stuck at 124 having killed her children and scared off any other family. Denver is stuck in the middle of a strange dynamic relationship between Sethe and Beloved. Denver finds strength and persistence in the hope that Halle will come for her. Denver’s connection to her mother allows her to escape “from Sethe’s presence and her retreat from the overwhelming jouissance of Beloved and the Real” (126). George adds that Denver identifies with Sethe and in order to not end up like her she leaves 124 and forms her own path for herself.

            To me I found Denver as a main character of course, but more in the background of the story. I always saw her as being left out and sort of forcing herself into the relationship between Sethe and Beloved. To think of her as a hero and driving force of the story is a very interesting outlook. The separation between Denver and her mother Sethe is very crucial I think. 124 and Sethe are clearly being haunted and manipulated by the past, which has taken form in Beloved. Morrison is pointing out that the past comes to haunt you and that for escaped slaves in this time period, the past is always chasing you. You don’t every feel safe. That takes a toll on an individual’s psyche. Denver was never a slave. So she differs from her mother there. She didn’t experience any of the horrible things that happened to her mother. And that is why she is afraid to really understand her mother and why she could kill her child. As George points out Denver wants to make sense of the situation but is scared. She is scared to leave 124 because something could happen to her out there that would in turn make her want to kill her own children one day. But eventually she does leave, she separates herself from 124 and the past that haunts that place. I think that the separation is something that is needed. You have to break clear of the past to fully move on. I think that is a point Morrison could be making. 124 no longer has the happy, safe, free, family oriented vibe that it originally possessed when Baby Suggs was there. Now it is full of death and horrible memories. To get away from the memories of slavery you need to leave it all behind. You can’t be held down by the past.