Beloved by Toni Morrison
Lesson plans and teaching resources

Summary, character analysis, theme, symbols and motifs, style and structure, and a list of key quotations.

Nine questions for discussion and/or writing.

Suggestions for analyzing the prose style, and 3 reading quizzes.

Students read a review of the movie Beloved as a starting-point for discussion and research focused on how the Civil War affected a variety of different people. Students then write a first-person narrative from the perspective of one of those people.

This TED-ED video (4:13) Amy E. Harter encourages students to read and write critically and thoughtfully by practicing insight, acknowledging complexity, and searching for big ideas. Captioned, includes follow-up questions. Uses examples from Pride and Prejudice and Beloved .

Students respond to the complicated narrative structure of the novel by visually representing the novel's non-linear organization. After discussion, students are guided through close readings of the three different accounts of the infanticide that Sethe commits, with the goal of making evident the ways in which identity and bias shape how characters, authors, and readers see and choose to represent the world.

A short article in which Morrison explains the genesis and development of the character, Beloved.

Questions for discussion and writing.

In this 10-minute clip, Morrison and others discuss their connection to the historical story that prompted Beloved and to the opera.

Words are presented in context and with definitions. Click on a word for pronunciation, examples of recent use, more.

An insightful review of the novel.