multiple fractured narratives, and this reflects the traumatic psychic effects of slavery. InA Mercy, we see the beginning of the trauma, and in Beloved, we see its continued traumatic impacts, centuries later. Both novels also show us fractured relationships between mothers and daughters: a minha mãe and Florens, and Sethe and Beloved. Slavery ripped families apart and destroyed intergenerational connections for generations.

The dust jacket to A Mercy says it is “almost a prelude to [Beloved], set two centuries earlier.” In the two novels, Morrison explores the traumatic legacy of the institution of slavery at two very different, but important, historical moments.

The previous educator was quite right in identifying the treatment of slavery in each book as a main point of difference. A Mercy focuses more on individual psyches in a historical context, whereas Beloved presents a more scathing and critical examination of slavery itself, and how the historical context drives each character's life. There are many literary elements, however, that are found in both works.

The narration of both books moves deftly between different points of view. Different chapters are told from the perspective of different characters, and some chapters are narrated by an objective, third-person omniscient voice. This allows the reader to glean individual character traits, a more complete picture of the entire story, and special insights of which the characters themselves are not capable.

These alternating, interweaving voices also allow for an extremely engaging variation in writing styles, in both Beloved and A Mercy. Chapters may be more or less formal than others; some may be rushed, hectic, and ethereal, while others are realistic and detailed. It contributes to the complexity of Morrison's stories, and the sense of profound interconnection between all the characters and their environment.

One way of comparing these two works is to think about the way in which Morrison presents slavery and race in them both. They are key themes of both works, but what is interesting is the way in which Morrison varies her treatment of slavery and race in either book to achieve a different effect.

In Beloved, for example, the prime focus is on the dehumanising effects of slavery. Much is made by the schoolteacher of the "animal characteristics" of slaves, as he regards them as just another form of animal. He has so much success that he manages to convince Sethe that slaves are another animal form, much to Paul D.'s disgust, and he is forced to tell her that "You got two feet, not four" in order to correct her. However, this novel also looks at the way in which slavery not just dehumanises slaves, but also dehumanises whites through the monsters that they become. Consider what Baby Suggs says about whites:

...they could prowl at will, change from one mind to another, and even when they thought they were behaving, it was a far cry from what real humans did.

Slavery is shown to be damaging to all of society, whatever their skin colour, as it is an institution that prevents humans from being human.

By contrast, although the dehumanising of slavery is something that is very much in evidence in A Mercy, its key focus seems to be the way in which Morrison examines the different grades or levels of slavery and freedom experienced by a wide range of servants. The servants in the Vaark household seem carefully chosen to represent a deliberate range of different types of slavery. On the one hand you have individuals such as the blacksmith, who, although he is African, has never experienced being a slave. On the other extreme you have Florens, who is black and a slave. In the middle you have the "mongrelised" Sorrow, white indentured servants and a Native American slave. Morrison deliberately challenges our ideas of slavery to present us with a range of characters who experience a range of different forms of slavery.