CHAPTER 1
Temporal Liminality in Toni Morrisonâs Beloved and A Mercy
Reading for posthuman liminality in black womenâs literature means that we must start simultaneously at the beginning and the end. Contemporary and even futuristic theories enhance our understanding of canonical texts, allowing us to revisit histories and ideas and interpret familiar stories in new ways. These types of border crossings pervade Toni Morrisonâs neoâslave narratives, Beloved (1987) and A Mercy (2008), and come to the forefront at each novelâs conclusion, when the reader participates in the storyâs creation.
Near the close of Beloved, Paul D asks Sethe to consider building a future with him as she continues the work of healing from her traumatic past. âSethe,â Paul D states, âme and you, we got more yesterday than anybody. We need some kind of tomorrowâ (Beloved 273). The bridge Paul D builds between yesterdayâs experiences and tomorrowâs promises transforms in the final chapter of the novel into a type of mantra. Morrison compels her readers to consider the relationship of the past to the present and future through the repeated statement, âIt was not a story to pass onâ (Beloved 274â75). The reiteration of the words âto pass onâ indicates both the finality of the past (âpassing onâ as the act of dying, of ceasing to exist in the present) and the movement of history into the future (âpassing onâ as the act of bequeathing knowledge or property to the next generation). As the mantra transitions from past to present tense, from âIt was not a story to pass onâ to âThis is not a story to pass onâ (Beloved 275), the links that connect past, present, and future become further intertwined. Despite the narratorâs insistence that the story not be passed on, it shifts, for the reader, from relic to reality, and the narrativeâs continued trajectory into the future seems all but certain.
In her most recent neoâslave narrative, A Mercy, Morrison similarly situates her novel as an artifact that transports tales from the past into the present and future. Both Florens and her mother share stories that never make it to their intended audiences, yet these stories do not simply âtalk to themselves,â as Florens fears (A Mercy 188). Instead, the historical narratives gain contemporary significance due to the readerâs interaction with the novel. The reader steps in to fill the role of the blacksmith, Florensâs lover and the desired recipient, despite his alleged illiteracy, of the narrative she carves into the walls and floorboards of Jacob Vaarkâs house. Additionally, in the final chapter, the reader takes the place of Florens and hears the message that her mother âlong[ed] to tellâ on the day Jacob bought her daughter (A Mercy 195â96). The readerâs participation in each womanâs narrative ensures that the words move âbeyond the eternal hemlocksââbeyond death or a forgotten historyâand go on to âflavor the soil of the earth,â where they will find continued life in the growth of spring (A Mercy 188).
The sense of overlapping past, present, and future temporalities that Morrison offers in Beloved and A Mercy accords with posthumanist notions of liminality. Posthuman theory provides a useful framework through which to read Morrisonâs neoâslave narratives and other historical narratives by black American writers, despite the seeming metachronism of studying black history through a theory that, in its name, focuses on that which is âpostâ human. According to posthuman theory, the subject exists within nexuses of power, knowledge, and discourse that continuously transform and are transformed by the subject. More than simply interconnected with the surrounding world, the posthuman being moves over and within the dividing lines that separate the individual from the governments, economies, technologies, communities, and people with which the individual interacts (Halberstam and Livingston 14). The problems and promise of posthuman culture stem from the multiplicity, fragmentation, and liminality of the temporalities, bodies, and subjectivities contained withinâissues that, although new in terms of their relation to the posthuman subjectâs existence in contemporary technoculture, have been addressed by black writers and theorists for more than a century (Eshun, âFurtherâ 301; Yaszek, âAfrofuturismâ 41â60; Gilroy, Small 178). If, as KalĂ Tal argues, âthe struggle of African-Americans is precisely the struggle to integrate identity and multiplicity,â then Morrisonâs Beloved and A Mercy, novels that share stories from black history and dreams of black futurity, present through their multiplicities evidence of posthuman liminality.
LIMINAL TEMPORALITIES AND SUBJECTIVITIES IN BELOVED
In Beloved, Morrison blurs boundaries of time and subjectivity by having Sethe, her protagonist, revisit her childhood, which allows Sethe not only to reframe and revise her traumatic history but also to position her past experiences as future focused. Although often studied as a mother, Sethe must additionally be understood as a daughter who struggles with feelings of abandonment concerning the maternal care of which she never received quite enough. Setheâs return to the position of childâa position rooted in the past yet future oriented because of the childâs continuous existence in a state of becomingâopens her to possibilities, identities, and connections from which she can access and exercise greater agency.
Posthumanist understandings of temporality and subjectivity allow for a new reading of Beloved. In the novel, Setheâs past infiltrates her present, a temporal shift many critics have understood as immediately stifling but ultimately empowering. Elizabeth Ann Beaulieu, Missy Dehn Kubitschek, Andrea OâReilly, and Caroline Rody find that although Setheâs history at the Sweet Home plantation plagues her present life, her âpainful reacquaintance with the past,â in Beaulieuâs words, allows her to develop more meaningful relationships with others (and with herself) in the present (Beaulieu 71). Reading Beloved through posthumanism adds a new layer of complexity to the critical study of time in the novel. Sethe does not simply reimagine or rewrite her past, as many critics assert. Nor does she return to the past to lay it to rest. Instead, Sethe understands her past, like her present and future, as existing in a state of continual development. Sethe brings her pastâ specifically, her childhood and motherâinto her present and future, and she also brings her future into the past in order to take power from the liminal subjectivity these temporal shifts engender.
The power of posthuman liminality manifests itself most clearly in Setheâs relationships with her mother and children. While critics typically conceive of the character Beloved as the return of Setheâs daughter who was killed eighteen years prior to the action in the novelâs opening, Belovedâs identity extends beyond this single time and this single child: she embodies the âSixty Million and moreâ captive Africans who died before they reached the shores of America (Clemons 75), as well as those who survived the Middle Passage to join the generations of the enslaved (OâReilly 87; Horwitz 157; Bouson 152).1 In the realm of Morrisonâs novel, Setheâs mother, a woman who died a violent death on the plantation where she was enslaved, must be included in this number, which means that Beloved represents not only the unnamed millions who suffered because of slavery but, for Sethe, both child and mother. Sethe therefore uses her relationship with the mysterious Beloved to resuscitate her role as a mother and her identity as a daughter. Through her return to the position of daughter, Sethe discovers a strength and forward-looking vision that allow her to begin building a future.
Because the connections between mother and child in Beloved transcend time and space, these lasting bonds can be considered in terms of the posthuman âbecoming-subjectâ (Halberstam and Livingston 14). Judith Halberstam and Ira Livingston use Gilles Deleuze and FĂ©lix Guattariâs theory of âbecomingâ to conceive of a posthuman being who experiences continual development due to a connection to surrounding elements:
Unlike the human subject-to-be (Lacanâs âlâhommeletteâ), who sees his own mirror image and fixed gender identity discrete and sovereign before him in a way that will forever exceed him, the posthuman becoming-subject vibrates across and among an assemblage of semi-autonomous collectivities it knows it can never either be coextensive with nor altogether separate from. The posthuman body is not driven, in the last instance, by a teleological desire for domination, death or stasis; or to become coherent and unitary; or even to explode into more disjointed multiplicities. Driven instead by the double impossibility and prerequisite to become other and to become itself, the posthuman body intrigues rather than desires[âŠ].(14)
Halberstam and Livingston indicate that connectivity allows the posthuman becoming-subject to exist simultaneously as self and other in the past, present, and future. Thus, posthuman theory helps articulate Setheâs dual positioning as mother and daughter as well as the potentiality of her nonlinear development. When read through posthumanism, Setheâs multiple identities take form as part of the posthuman âimpossibility and prerequisite to become other and to become itselfâ (Halberstam and Livingston 14), which gains specificity for Sethe as the yearning to become mother and to become self. By developing a dual self and mother identity, Sethe incorporates her dreams for the future into her understanding of her past.
The physical and emotional bonds shared by Sethe and her children evidence the liminal identities characteristic of and the liminal temporalities inhabited by posthuman becoming-subjects. Setheâs intense connection with her children blurs the boundaries that exist between self and other, past and future. Jean Wyatt draws upon Lacanâs theory of the imaginary and symbolic orders in order to argue that rather than allowing Setheâs children (or Sethe herself) to transition from the realm of imagined wholeness with the motherâs body to the symbolic order of (maternal) absence and loss, Morrison creates a system that, âlike Lacanâs symbolic, locates subjects in relation to other subjectsâ but, unlike Lacanâs symbolic, refuses the paternalistic mandate for physical distance between mother and child (âGivingâ 475). According to Wyatt, Morrison replaces Lacanâs understanding of the symbolic as a âmove away from bodies touching to the compensations of abstract signifiersâ with her view of a âmaternal symbolicâ that âmakes physical contact the necessary support for Setheâs full acceptance of the separate subjectivity required by language systemsâ (âGivingâ 484). In other words, the lasting bonds between mothers and children in Morrisonâs novel reveal that subjectivity depends on communal connections rather than separations. The notion of the individual developing through the communityâthe self forming alongside and even in conjunction with the otherâ corresponds with the paradox of the posthuman becoming-subject. The becoming-subject exists yet has not (and never will) fully come into being, given its impossible journey both âto become other and to become itselfâ (Halberstam and Livingston 14). This constant development defines posthuman subjectivity, which makes the becoming-subject an apt figure through which to study Morrisonâs characters.
Reading Sethe as a becoming-subject additionally requires an understanding of her dual identity as daughter and mother. Sethe not only intertwines her sense of self with the identities of her children, but her real and imagined relationships with her mother additionally shape her past, present, and future. By mothering others, Sethe attempts to bring into her present reality the physically and emotionally fulfilling motherâchild relationship she never experienced during her early life because of slavery. Sethe remembers her biological motherâknown to her simply as âMaâamââas a stranger she saw âa few times out in the fields and once when she [Maâam] was working indigoâ (Beloved 60). When telling Beloved and Denver stories of her childhood, Sethe foregrounds her physical estrangement from her mother, stating, âShe didnât even sleep in the same cabin most nights I rememberâ (Beloved 60â61). Although she believes her mother must have nursed her for âtwo or three weeksâ or at least âa week or twoâ during her infancy (Beloved 60, 203), Sethe cannot recall receiving sustenance or comfort from her biological mother. She knows only that Nan, the woman who nursed her after Maâam returned to the fields, nursed many children and ânever had enough [milk] for allâ (Beloved 203).
The deprivation of motherâs milk stands as a symbol of the maternal losses that shape Setheâs childhood and inspire her in her adult life to mother others, including Beloved. Nancy Chodorow theorizes that the physical and emotional bonds that develop between mother and child during the feeding process are as significant as the actual sustenance a child receives. Although Freud and others have argued that the bond between mother and child comes from the physiological act of breastfeeding, Chodorow adds that the physical and emotional interaction of child and mother (or child and caregiver) creates positive feelings as well (65). According to Chodorow, time spent touching the mother while receiving food not only bonds mother and child during the childâs early life but also influences the childâs later life as an adult.
As Chodorowâs theory suggests, the absence of her motherâs milk affects Sethe during her adulthood. Specifically, Setheâs early experiences with her mother shape her mothering. Sethe communicates her physical and emotional estrangement from her mother by stating that as a child she had âno nursing milk to call [her] ownâ (Beloved 200). However, as a mother, Sethe takes pride in her ability to care for her children, proclaiming that she has âmilk enough for allâ (Beloved 100).2 When Sethe arrives at 124 Bluestone Road, her home in the free state of Ohio, her body enables her to nurse her children and also to provide for their physical and emotional comfort. Sethe celebrates the feat of surviving her escape from Sweet Home by encircling all of her children with her arms: âI was big, Paul D, and deep and wide and when I stretched out my arms all my children could get in between. I was that wideâ (Beloved 162). Wyatt argues that Setheâs body takes on âmythic dimensionsâ: her âmonumental body and abundant milk give and sustain lifeâ (âGivingâ 476). The fantastical expansion Sethe envisions occurring to her body and maternal capabilities allows her to physically join with her children (they move âin betweenâ her arms) and blur the boundaries that differentiate self and other.
Significantly, Setheâs mythic mothering shifts from giving and physically sustaining life to fulfilling her childrenâs (especially Belovedâs) emotional needs. Morrison again presents Setheâs devoted mothering in stark contrast to Maâamâs maternal absence, a juxtaposition that highlights the permeable boundaries that exist in Beloved not only between self and other but also among past, present, and future. While Maâam lived apart from Sethe and ânever fixed [her] hair nor nothingâ (Beloved 60), Sethe commits herself to meeting each of Belovedâs demands. Sethe feeds, clothes, and entertains Beloved by cooking and sewing with her, and she demonstrates her affection for Beloved by playing with âBelovedâs hair, braiding, puffing, tying, oiling it until it made Denver nervous to watch herâ (Beloved 239â40). Setheâs strategy of satisfying Belovedâs physical and emotional desires by attending to her bodyâspecifically, sating her hunger with breast milk when she is an infant and demonstrating their closeness by playing with her hair when she is a young adultâemphasizes the lasting impact of the physical and emotional relationship (or lack thereof) that exists between mother and child. In temporal terms, Setheâs negative past experiences with her mother shape her own mothering choices in the present. Maâamâs absence and Setheâs subsequent suffering inspire Sethe to protect her children from the same fate by fullyâand as many critics have argued, excessivelyâdevoting her body to her offspring.
While Setheâs maternal body provides for her children, her own daughterly body still suffers from a want of care because of her motherâs absence. Sethe attempts through her mothering to heal her past and present daughterly suffering and ward off any future pain she or her children might experience. She dedicates her body to fulfilling Belovedâs needs, transferring her bodyâs power to Beloved: âThe bigger Beloved got, the smaller Sethe became; the brighter Belovedâs eyes, the more those eyes that used never to look away became slits of sleeplessness. Sethe no longer combed her hair or splashed her face with water. She sat in the chair licking her lips like a chastised child while Beloved ate up her life, took it, swelled up with it, grew taller on it. And the older woman yielded it up without a murmurâ (Beloved 250). Sethe seeks through her mothering to strengthen her childrenâs bodies in order to protect themâand their family linkâfrom being appropriated by the white owner or, on a larger level, white culture.
In addition to furthering the goal of protecting her children, Setheâs tending to others and her contentment with her relational identity can be understood to develop out of her personal need for nurturance. OâReilly argues that Setheâs mothering works to counter âthe commodification of African Americans under slavery and the resulting disruption of the African American motherline,â the tradition of care that unites black mothers and children (139). In positioning Setheâs mothering as a political act that empowers Sethe through the reconstitution of her motherline, OâReilly departs from critics, including Wyatt and Demetrakopoulos, who argue that Setheâs mothering reflects her willingness to efface her individual subjectivity in favor of a relational identity (Wyatt, âGivingâ 476; Demetrakopoulos 52). Venetria K. Patton and Kubitschek likewise acknowledge that Setheâs mothering is not completely self-effacing. Patton finds that âSetheâs consuming love is based on a newfound selfishness once she is in a position to claim ownership of herself and her childrenâ (128), and Kubitschek argues that Setheâs self-interested desire to be mothered (rather than a selfish claim of ownership) motivates or contributes to her mothering of others.
Sethe seeks to assuage the pain of her past by assuming both the mother and child positions in her relationship with Beloved, which means that Beloved also exists as both mother and daughter. Morrison situates Sethe and Beloved in a motherâdaughter relationship beginning the moment the childlike Beloved appears on the stump outside of 124 and Sethe feels the overwhelming urge to relieve herself, which she later understands as her water breaking (Beloved 51, 202). However, as their bond develops, Sethe begins to assume a daughterly role in relation to the maternal Beloved, a shift noticed by scholars including OâReilly and Deborah Horwitz. Observing Beloved and her mother together, Denver notes, âBeloved bending over Sethe looked the mother, Sethe the teething childâ (Beloved 250). In addition to appearance, Sethe and Belovedâs behavior indicates a transformation in their relationship. Although Sethe repeatedly asserts that she believes her deceased daughter has returned in the form of Beloved, she relates to Beloved as if the young woman were a reincarnation of her mother, not her daughter. Sethe compares her relationship with Beloved to her relationship with her mother, stating that Beloved âcame right on back like a good girl, like a daughter which is what I wanted to be and would have been if my maâam had been able to get out of the rice long enough before they hanged her and let me be oneâ (Beloved 203). While Sethe initially views Belovedâs actions as a daughterâs departure from and subsequent return to her mother, as she continues to consider their situation, she focuses on maternal (rather than daughterly) absences: âI wonder what they [her mother and the other women] was doing when they was caught. Running, you think? No. Not that. Because she was my maâam and nobodyâs maâam would run off and leave her daughter, would she?â (Beloved 203). Setheâs turn toward memories of her motherâs absence indicates that Beloved becomes a stand-in not for the devoted daughter who returns to the mother but the good mother who refuses to abandon (and, hence, returns to) her daughter.
The interior monologues Morrison presents in part 2 of her novel support a reading of Beloved as Setheâs mother and reinforce the existence of circular or liminal temporalities in Beloved. In Belovedâs monologue, readers bear witness to the movement of the past into the present and future (and vice versa) through Belovedâs descriptions of the motherâs return to the daughter and the daughterâs return to the mother during the Middle Passage. Morrison first introduces Setheâs motherâs Middle Passage experience through Nan, who tells a young Sethe that âher mother and Nan were together fr...