Myths of Freedom in Toni Morrison's Beloved

Introduction: The Myth of Northern Freedom

Toni Morrison is known as one of the foremost novelists of recent decades, standing out as a voice for the Black female in modern literature. In Morrison's novel Beloved, a new perspective is given on the impact of slavery on the individual and society, as well as on the development of history overall. Beloved is a story about a mother, Sethe, who had once been enslaved on a plantation. When faced with a situation in which her "free" children will be taken back into slavery, she kills her infant daughter to save her. Living in Ohio — a state regarded, somewhat mistakenly, as a safe haven for escaped slaves from the South — along with her older daughter and a male love interest, Sethe watches as the dead infant returns in the body of a childlike, full-grown woman.

Through the events that take place in the novel, Morrison explores the historical myth that if an escaped slave reached the North, that slave would then be free. However, due to legal decisions such as the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, slaves could be returned to their previous owners even if they lived in a Northern state. Morrison is familiar with the relationship between fact and fiction, history and myth: "in Beloved she has offered a different conception of the relationship between history and fiction, acknowledging that all history is 'imagined,' and that all knowledge of the past is derived from representations, such as Beloved itself" (Davis). Additionally, Morrison shows that, even if escaped slaves were not physically returned to their previous owners, freedom may be a myth in other ways as well. Absolute freedom for escaped slaves was nothing more than a myth because of legal, psychological, and sociological reasons.

The Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 and Legal Bondage

One historical event that is very important in the novel Beloved is the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. This law "meant that slavery was the law of the land, not just of the slave states" (Sauder). It was an attempt to compromise between the interests of slaveholders and Northern states, as the Southern states were deeply upset that the North would aid runaway slaves and often directly interfere with attempts to recapture them. The Fugitive Slave Law made it illegal to harbor slaves, assist slaves, or even refuse to arrest runaways.

"In fact the Fugitive Slave Law brought the issue home to anti-slavery citizens in the North, since it made them and their institutions responsible for enforcing slavery. Even moderate abolitionists were now faced with the immediate choice of defying what they believed an unjust law or breaking with their own conscience and belief" (NoSeptember). This law is the reason that Sethe and her family were not legally free in Ohio, and the reason that her former owner could come to reclaim the children — which is why Beloved was killed. Legally, freedom from slavery would not exist until fifteen years later, when the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution outlawed slavery (JW1805).

Psychological Slavery and the Traumatic Past

Even if Sethe and her family had been completely free legally, "freedom" from slavery would have been nothing more than a myth because they were unable to mentally escape their past experiences. "In Beloved, Morrison allows the reader to share the legacy of slavery as the characters Sethe, Paul D, and Denver attempt to make a new life in freedom. However, they cannot put the past, lived in slavery, behind them; they must reveal it to themselves, to each other, and to the reader in 'digestible pieces'" (Nigro). The traumatic events experienced by slaves cannot simply be erased, and the past continues to exert a powerful effect on the present and future.

Today, the concept of post-traumatic stress disorder — the psychological consequences of experiencing traumatic events — would perhaps be identified in Morrison's characters (Feldspar). Nightmares, flashbacks, irritability, emotional detachment, and other forms of distress are common symptoms, and they are certainly experienced by Sethe and others in Beloved. All of these constitute a kind of continued mental slavery, demonstrating that physical emancipation alone does not constitute true freedom.

Conclusion: Freedom as Myth in Beloved

Toni Morrison reveals that freedom is more myth than reality for the escaped slaves in the novel Beloved. "How can Sethe escape the relentless definition of herself and her community as property? How can she find an alternative to the colonial/slave system of binaries that has infiltrated every part of her life?" (Elliott). It is not possible to erase the past. The Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 made it legal for slaveholders to reclaim slaves from Northern states and made it illegal for others to intervene. Combined with the psychological impact of slavery's trauma and the unsupportive community surrounding Sethe, she and her family do not find true freedom from slavery despite physically moving to a nominally "free" state. Morrison's novel insists that freedom is not a destination to be reached by crossing a geographical boundary, but a far more complex condition that the institution of slavery had rendered, for many, permanently out of reach.