Recollections And Repressions In Toni Morrison’s Beloved (1987)

Résumé: The aim of this study was to discuss the theme of memory and trauma in Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987). The focus of this dissertation is on the repressed memories and the traumatic experiences of the characters. Indeed, the stress is on the depiction of the characters repressed inner past memories like Paul D, Sethe and Denver. To achieve this aim, we relied on Cathy Caruth's trauma theory “Trauma: Exploration in Memory” (1995) and “Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative and History” (1996). We have shown how Toni Morrison brought to the surface of the inner thoughts of the characters and depicted them in struggling with their past through memories and different incidents that brought them to their actual situations. We also explored the way she raised the theme of memory and trauma as a dominant themes in the novel. In the end, we studied the modernist techniques mainly the use of flashbacks to reveal to which extent to which the traumatic memories affected the characters of Beloved and took an important part in their lives. We reached the conclusion that Toni Morrison focuses on the link between the events and their traumatic impact on the characters in the context of trauma theory.

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