Conflict between Daughter and Mother in Toni Morrison's Beloved

The Beloved is a novel by Toni Morrison and begins in 1873 in Cincinnati, Ohio with Sethe and her eighteen-year-old daughter Denver with Sethe as the main characters in the book. The novel was written in the 1980s in Albany New York and first published in 1987 by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. the primary narrator of the story is omniscient and anonymous although in several parts of the book the narrator is taken over the characters. Further, the narrator speaks in the third person also withholds on the judgement of the actions taken. The tone of the novel changes from character to character and reflects on the explicit attitudes towards the events. Conflict forms one of the most crucial aspects of the story which comes from different areas such as slavery and Seth having killed her older daughter to keep her from being taken to her old Master. 

The central conflict in the Beloved is between Sethe and Beloved both in her flesh form and ghost form. Further, the struggle for slavery is also another form of conflict that the novel indicates vividly. Sethe the main characters in the story experience substantial internal conflict between her life, the present life, and the scaring events that have occurred to her during the time she was a slave. In the novel, Sethe takes the life of her daughter out of love to protect and free her from the troubles and harshness of slavery ( Morrison, 2014 ). Due to her actions, the ghost of her daughter haunts her conscience, and later it comes to torment her about the act which she committed out of love. From the moment she slits the throat of her daughter to the time the novel ends the readers is mainly associated with the justification of her Actions. 

The central aspect of structure that the author uses in the presentation of her characters in the story and the several conflicts they face is from the point of view. Furthermore, the shifting perspective in the story presents a vivid characterisation of the characters where the redress gains insights on what is the reason for making some individual tick instead of one character ( Morrison, 2014 ). This helps cement the narrative style of the story as it shifts to the third person perspective in four consecutive sections. Such a technique helps the reader understand the characters later in the novel and depends on the knowledge of the reader on the characters and the conflicts they face. 

Conflict in the novel Beloved contributes a lot to the meaning of the story. In the tale Morrison forces characters to recognise the pain from their past notably Sethe before they can start to work on it. Furthermore, not only does the story offer the possibility of reconciliation with the past but also a better understanding of the story in a symbolic way with Beloved serving as the symbol. Furthermore, most of the inhumane and brutal treatment and with the main characters in the story unable to accept their past ( Morrison, 2014 ). On the contrary, Beloved is used as a symbol by the writer to offer a chance to make peace before looking on the future. Further, it represents the possibility of the supernatural rebirth into a better and new world. In the story, beloved represents the historical impacts of slavery and the three generations of slavery which Morrison does well in presenting. The story mainly communicates the negative effects of slavery that people went through and how it affected later generations. 

Reference 

Morrison, T. (2014).  Beloved . London: Vintage Digital, 2014.