OUR NON- fiCtiON ARtiClE

Beloved

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1987, Beloved is an astonishing portrayal of the brutal impact racial intolerance has had on black America. Set in Ohio after the Civil War, it tells the story of Sethe, an escaped slave who cannot get beyond the unspeakable agony of her past. The famous first lines of the book are a gripping and stark description of the house Sethe lives in with her daughter, Denver, and the mother of her dead husband:

124 was spiteful. Full of a baby's venom. The women in the house knew it and so did the children."

Morrison's language is so vivid and rich that nearly every page is a stunning piece of art. The story is complex and profound, telling - perhaps better than any book ever has- the ugly and wrenching story of slavery in America. It is as much a "must read" as any book of the twentieth century and has staked its claim as such in most college, and many high school, curriculum. Like most great literature, it can be read again and again with an increased gut-level understanding each time.

The history of the black experience in America is still being told - in bits and pieces and occasional flashes of genius such as this. There is much more to be understood and much more to be chronicled, but Toni Morrison's ongoing eloquence is a gift that makes that task seem do-able.

Morrison won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993 for her entire body of work. Now 75, she works as Professor of Humanities at Princeton University and continues to write. Her last novel was Love, published in 2003.