5MaternityandRememory.PDF

Maternity and Rememory 9 3 MARIANNE HIRSC H narratives : the distancing and objectification of mothers, the nostalgia tha t surrounds them, the tone of celebration and mystification, and the invers e degradation with which they are shaped . 5 Maternity and Rememory : How much more unusual to have the opposite sequence-a maternal narra- tive haunted by the ghost of a child . Through such a violent and disturbing Toni Morrisons Beloved reversal of generational continuity, Toni MorrisonsBeloved allows us to look a t womens writing from the different perspective of maternal subjectivity (Mor- rison, 1987) . 2 I undertake this exploration of maternity at a moment of crucial urgency fo r feminist inquiry. At a moment