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"It is the ultimate gesture of a loving mother. It is the outrageous claim of a slave." These are the words that Toni Morrison used to describe the actions of the central character within the novel, Beloved. That character, Sethe, is presented as a former slave woman who chooses to kill her baby girl rather than allowing her to be exposed to the physically, emotionally, and spiritually oppressive horrors of a life spent in slavery. Sethe's action is indisputable: She has killed her child.
Sethe's motivation is not so clearly defined. By killing her "Beloved" child, has Sethe acted out of true love or selfish pride? The fact that Sethe's act is irrational can easily be decided upon. Does Sethe kill her baby girl because she wants to save the baby from slavery or does Sethe end her daughter's life because of a selfish refusal to reenter a life of slavery? By examining the complexities of Sethe's character it can be said that she is a woman who chooses to love her children but not herself. Sethe kills her baby because, in Sethe's mind, her children are the only good and pure part of who she is and must be protected from the cruelty and the "dirtiness" of slavery.
In this respect, her act is that of love for her children. Throughout Beloved, Sethe's character consistently displays the dualistic nature of her actions. Not long after Sethe's reunion with Paul D. she describes her reaction to School Teacher's arrival. Sethe's words suggest that she has made a moral stand by her refusal to allow herself and her children to be dragged back into the evil of slavery. From the beginning, it is clear that Sethe believes that her actions were morally justified.
The peculiarity of her statement lies in her omission of the horrifying fact that her moral stand was based upon the murder of her child. By not even approaching the subject of her daughter's death, it is also made clear that Sethe has detached herself from the act. Sethe's frustration is a product of her contradictory reasoning. She views her children as an extension of her life that needed to be protected, at any cost. Sethe's concept of loving and protecting her children becomes synonymous with her killing Beloved and attempting to kill the rest. Sethe can see no wrong here.
Placing her children outside the horror of slavery, even if it meant taking their lives, was in her mind a justified act of love, nothing more. Sethe's problem is rooted in her inability to recognize the boundaries between herself and her children. Paul D. stabs at the heart of this problem by suggesting that Sethe had overstepped her boundaries by killing her child. The concept that Sethe equates her life and self-worth with her connection to her children is most graphically illustrated in her mad ravings to the reincarnation of "Beloved." Sethe details a defense for killing her baby to the woman she believes is her reincarnated, murdered daughter. Saving her children from slavery and the promise of spiritual and emotional death that such an institution imposes is the rational of love that Sethe's character clings to.
The truth that Sethe's character selfishly avoids is the actual physical death that she has inflicted upon her child. Understanding why a woman would kill any child, let alone her own baby, is complex Sethe's character is no exception. Sethe's motivation does not fit into a simple schematic. Sethe is presented as a woman who loves her children so much that she is willing to kill them rather than allow them to be broken by an evil institution. Love is, then, Sethe's primary motivation for killing her baby. However, Sethe's love for her children does not preclude her responsibility for Beloved's death.
Indeed, Sethe's selfish fault lies in the fact that she has shifted the focus of responsibility from herself to the institution that has spawned her. Bibliography: Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1987. Morrison, Toni.
Interview. Documentary. Public Broadcasting Company. 1987.
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