Chapter 1 pages 3-23:
Baby Suggs is the mother of Halle's mother. Halle is Sethe's Husband also the father of Sethe's four children. Halle is the son of Baby Suggs's son and he bought Baby Suggs out of slavery which cost Halle his Sundays. Sethe's sons Howard and Burglar fled the house that they lived in with their grandmother Baby Sugg's, Denver, and their mother Sethe. After the house taunted them for the very last time. The house was known to be haunted by Sethe's baby daughter who had died when she was younger than two by getting her throat cut. The last straw for Burglar was taunting him by shattering the mirror when he simply looked into it. The last straw for Howard was when there were two small baby handprints appeared on the cake. They did not wait and fled the house at the age of 13years old. Baby Suggs passed about and there was only Sethe and Denver left to be dealing with what the house would bring. Sethe had was poor and could not afford to have Dearly Beloved on her daughter’s tombstone so Sethe did what she thought she had to do and that give up herself for 7 minutes in order to get the letters, Beloved. She had thoughts that if only she would have given herself up for longer to get the words she truly wanted on the tombstone which was, " Dearly Beloved."
As Sethe was outside washing her bare feet she saw a man Paul D a man has known know for eighteen plus years from her home town Sweet Home. Although Sethe knew the man standing there look familiar she called out the name of the name she once remembered Paul D. Sethe and Paul D walked up to the house porch. Sethe and Paul D started to talk, the Death was mentioned of Baby Suggs, with Paul D asking if her death was hard? Sethe commented back that it was not but yet soft as cream. Paul D and Sethe entered the how Paul D entered after Sethe and he saw red and ask Seth what on Earth is in the house as she saw red and felt sudden anger. In the house, Paul D met Sethe's last reaming child, their daughter. After a while Sethe and Paul D started to talk about what Sethe had endured, leaving her children with a woman in the wagon, being stopped by the white men and the "school teacher," to only be pinned down and have her breast milk stolen, to being whipped so severely that she had lashing all over her back which later was described what looks like tree and branches all while she was pregnant with Denver.
The chapter ends with Denver being sad that Paul D had gotten rid of the spirit of the house. She missed her brothers and grandmother. At least with the spirit of the baby in the house, Denver did not sit in the house alone.
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