Motherhood

In his article Slavery and Motherhood in Toni Morrison’s Beloved, Terry Paul Caesar writes of the mother and daughter relationship between Sethe and her two girls, Denver and Beloved. As he read Beloved through the Feminist Lens, he came to realize the weak bond between Sethe and Beloved in their mother and daughter relationship. According to Caesar, although Sethe fails to show affection towards Beloved the way a mother normally would show to her daughter, her love for her daughter is great and powerful. She shows her love through the killing of her baby. As a slave mother, she knew exactly what was in store for Beloved’s future. She knew that she would suffer in the future, so to keep that from happening, Sethe did what most would consider to be the unbelievable and ended her own baby’s life. She did what she believed was best for her child. By taking away her life, she took away the pain that Beloved was bound to endure if she had stayed alive.

Although I had never thought of it that way, I totally agree with Caesar’s interpretation of Sethe’s motherly love. Sethe was stuck with a dilemma. It was either she allow her baby to grow up and face the pain she once did or she take her baby’s life and save her from the misery that is doomed to occur in her life. It is a mother’s instinct to protect their child from any dangers or trouble. And it was Sethe’s mother instinct that caused her to choose to kill her baby. That is the worst crime any mother can commit. Sethe committed this big crime  but did not view it as a crime because she was doing what she believed every mother would do and took the pain away.