Text: Beloved Toni Morrison
Critical Lens: Psychoanalytic Lens
“Circularity in Toni Morrison’s Beloved” by Phillip Page is written by a scholar of English literature at Indiana State University. As such, this provides a very useful treatment of the accuracy of Morrison’s work, including Beloved. Page is very honest about the areas in which novels like Beloved are useful in providing context about circularity and foreshadowing.
Page describes Morrison at his best as “this image of circling controls the crucial scene, for circles and circle metaphors dominate the novel.” This seems highly applicable to Beloved, which particularly explores issues of flashbacks and such. This is, of course, most clearly seen through all of the characters, who appear in the novel in flashbacks. The portrayal of circles in the novel is not always picked up considering the complexity of Morrison’s writing style. However, if a reader were to pick up on circularity in Beloved, it would be shown that such an idea is prevalent in most aspects of Sethe’s life, i.e. her family, her relationship with Paul D, the truth about Beloved’s passing.
Page claims that circularity in Beloved is not always either positive or negative but, rather, it is a mix of both. It is also widely accepted that circularity is a metaphor for life, from rebirth to growth to death. Beloved depicts that in all aspects of Sethe’s life, there was rebirth, growth, and death. For instance, when the character of Beloved appeared in front of Sethe’s house, it was as if her dead baby had been reborn as a spiritual entity. Eventually, she grew into a what seemed like a young woman who was willing to take over Sethe’s life. Finally, she finished the circle, and “died” by disappearing.
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