Beloved Initial Response #1 Consider the following images and what patterns or motifs you have observed emerging

in the novel so far. How does Morrison use these images to create a foundation for memories? You may develop a response to whichever image(s) you want. Trees In my opinion, one of the most powerful, vivid images in the book is the chokecherry tree on Sethes back. Toni Morrison references the tree first in the very beginning of the book, when Sethe tells Paul D, I got a tree on my back and a haint in my house, and nothing in between but the daughter I am holding in my arms. Paul D doubts the trees existence at first, as he cant see it growing out of her back, but Sethe knows its there all the same. He first senses it not by seeing it, but by feeling it with his cheek as he embraces Sethe. Looking back from later in the book, I can better understand the chokecherry trees story. Schoolteacher had one of his nephews put it there after Sethe told Mrs. Garner what he and his boys had done to Sethe. Amy discovered it when Sethe found her on the banks of the river. I find it interesting that the picture the whitegirl paints for Sethe is not bloody and gruesome, but beautiful. Im not sure what this means. Beloved is very much about rebirth and new beginnings from old, incurable injuries. Sethe was flogged to the point of permanent mutilation, but she is left with springtime irreversibly engraved on her body. Later on, she even says to Paul D that the tree could have cherries now for all I know. The price of her escape could have borne fruit. Paul D, however, eventually concludes that Sethes scar is not a tree. He compares it to a wrought-iron maze instead. Not a tree, as she said, he thinks. Maybe shaped like one, but nothing like any tree he knew because trees were inviting; things you could trust and be near; talk to if you wanted to as he frequently did since way back when he took the midday meal in the fields of Sweet Home. For Paul D, trees provide a kind of security, both at Sweet Home and in his chain gang after he is sold. Wherever he goes, there are always trees to welcome and shelter him. They are omnipresent, but they never take part in the daily struggles of mankind. Trees have different meanings for Sethe and Paul D. For Sethe, a tree is a symbol of rebirth. Her chokecherry tree rises from the pain and humiliation of the end of her time at Sweet Home to bear fruit for her future. It reminds her of her past as a slave, but also of her meeting with Amy where she fought with death and won. For Paul D, trees are a constant in a world where nothing can be relied upon. He wanders for years and years after he escapes slavery, but no matter where he goes, he can count on the trees not to betray him. He cant trust the tree on Sethes back because it came from a whitemans malice, so it is unnatural in his eyes. In either case, trees signify reliable, benevolent, life-giving nature.