P.S. Toni Morrison's Beloved Drafts

"The point is so that it doesn’t look like it’s sweating like that effort, you see? It must appear effortless!"

Here’s something I’ve learned from studying notes: great writing looks easy, but it is incredibly difficult. Toni Morrison never shows her work. To use her metaphor, the seams don’t show. Her novels are so well-crafted, it feels as though she just sat down at her desk and began writing, emerging a few hours later with Beloved.

Of course, that’s not the case. On Monday, we saw her deep research into Beloved’s historical moment and the horrors of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. For this postscript, let’s look at the work that followed: how Toni combed through draft after draft to produce Beloved.

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These post-scripts offer paid subscribers a deeper dive into the note-takers I cover in Noted’s regular posts. You can read my full post on Morrison’s notes for free here. If you look forward to reading Noted, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get additional weekly content, and you’ll help keep this newsletter going! This is the last week to get 20% off.