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Beloved
from Desirè Sharp, ENG 113 student

Beloved, a 1987 novel by Toni Morrison, is a novel that depicts the story of a young woman who escapes slavery and kills her infant child to do so. Though she achieved escape, she still lives with the vivid images of many things she saw and endured and is haunted by the reincarnated spirit of her murdered baby. Frequently challenged for its use of violence, bestiality, sex and racism, Beloved has been both criticized and praised.

Controversy
Toni Morrison wrote one hell of a book with Beloved. This book has been repeatedly challenged and even banned from many school curriculums. Some parents think that due to its raw nature on topics of sex, race and violence, students should be required to get parental permission before being required to read it. Two parents in a Michigan school district tried to ban the novel as they deemed it “inappropriate”. Another parent argued at a public hearing that the novel “equates to a 5th grade reading level” (Clark). Anna Clark does not think this is the case. She writes that Beloved is “difficult, complex in language and narrative…”, something a reader at a 5th grade level could not comprehend. Clark states that she was told by literature teacher Brian Read that “the real reason behind their challenge was that [they believed] the novel was deemed an inappropriately ‘fictitious’ account about the real life issue of slavery”.

Even with the many naysayers to this novel, it is still praised as one of the best novels ever written, winning Pulitzer and Nobel Prizes in Fiction and Literature respectively. A New York Times poll in 2006 named Beloved "the single best work of American fiction published in the last twenty-five years" (Metcalf). This novel was so well thought out, Morrison took two years just thinking about it and nearly three years writing it! Caldwell states, “The novel is extraordinary…with a lyricism equal to the sadness it plumbs” (263). In his online article, Metcalf exclaims that Beloved is so elegantly drawn with its inclusion of prose, repetition, synecdoche and triumph, there is no way this novel could be demeaned or unappealing to a reader. However, Sethe (the novel’s main character) murdered her infant child! She does this in an attempt to avoid recapture into slavery and “outhurt the hurter” (Jones 219). This might be seen as a highly cruel act, but Sethe saw it as rescuing her child from the dehumanization that is slavery (219). This level of cruelty could greatly be a reason to want this novel banned from schools. No parent would exactly want their child reading of an infant being killed by its mother. But is this novel truly any different from that of a Harry Potter book, Stephen King novel or Shakespeare play? Literature teacher Brian Read definitely does not believe so. One parent argued that Beloved has a low Lexile score, which indicates how well a text teaches a person to read. Read immediately pointed out that “Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet has a low Lexile score, and no one would challenge the literary value of that” (Clark).

Executive director of Women in Media and News Jennifer Pozner also found value in Morrison’s novel. Anna Clark writes in her online article that Pozner found the “complicated discussion on rage and fear and love” an essential part in simultaneously thinking about race and gender when reading Beloved. Caldwell exclaims that thanks to Morrison, color and gender divisions among contemporary fiction have become blurred over the last decade. Additionally Morrison’s contribution “stands tall against any literary standard” (265).

Clemons notes that in Beloved, "the incantatory, intimate narrative voice disarms our reluctance to enter Sethe's haunted house" (263). Many of the challenges to this novel are sourced to information found solely on the internet. Very few challengers have read the book and don't investigate past one or two [not so reliable] sources of information before forming an opinion. This is extremely insufficient and does a major disservice to students. The tone of the novel, development of characters and plot and vivid details are many of the things that help develop strong writing skills and create interest in a required reading. In Baldassarro's article, President of the Detroit Branch of the ACLU of Michigan Loren Khogali said, "It is alarming that a vocal minority has been successful in denying students these valuable works of literature. Shutting down ideas in the classroom not only raises constitutional concerns, but goes against the very essence of our educational system.

Plymouth-Canton Schools in Michigan was one of the few schools who opted [voted] to maintain the novel in the school curriculum.