on others in the process. As her experience in slavery came to define her life as a free woman, Sethe wallowed in her past, becoming a hero only when she allowed those she loved to escape their own burdens from the de-humanizing effects of slavery. Denver, on the other hand, breaks free of her past isolation in order to help Sethe seek a future beyond the constraints of her past. Morrison highlights that individuals have the ability to act with heroism, choosing to bring others out of the desolation of their past burden. Such a phenomenon can be enacted in current society by resisting the ideals of society, but rather, standing up for own beliefs to find heroism in the face of great opposition. Major characters Sethe Sethe is the protagonist of the novel. She escaped slavery from a plantation called Sweet Home. She lives in the house named 124 (a house on 124 Bluestone Rd., but referred to only as "124") which is believed to be haunted because she killed her infant child there. Her two sons have fled because of the haunting, and she resides in the house with her daughter Denver. She is motherly and will do anything to protect her children from suffering the same abuses she experienced when she was enslaved. She is greatly influenced by her repression of the trauma she endured. She lives with "a tree on her back", scars from being whipped. Her character is resilient, yet defined by her traumatic past. She was 19 years old when Denver was born, making her birth year to be 1836. Beloved The opaque understanding of Beloved is central to the novel. She is a young woman who mysteriously appears from a body of water near Sethe's house, and is discovered soaking wet on the doorstep by Sethe, Paul D, and Denver, on their return from visiting the fair; they take her in. She is widely believed to be the murdered baby who haunted 124, as the haunting ends when she arrives, and in many ways she behaves like a child. As also mentioned, a young woman enslaved by a White man nearby had escaped, and Beloved recounts stories of past slaves, including Sethe's mother. Morrison stated that the character Beloved is the daughter Sethe killed. The murdered baby was unnamed, so her name is derived from the engraving on Sethe's murdered baby's tombstone, which