Chapter 24 Journal Entry for Beloved

Chapter 24

41. What new information do we learn about the attempted escape from Sweet Home in this chapter?
    
42. “Paul D hears the men talking and for the first time learns his worth. He has always known, or believed he did, his value -- as a hand, a laborer who could make a profit on a farm -- but now he discovers his worth, which is to say he learns his price.” Why is this such an important moment for Paul D? How do you think it affects him to hear “his worth”? 
    
    41. In this chapter we learn more about the fates of the others at Sweet Home. For example, we learn that Sixo was burned alive, but his thirty mile woman escaped, with his child in her womb. Paul D recounts that when Sixo was captured he began to laugh, and Sixo never laughed. Schoolteacher considered him ruined, as he later considered Sethe, they had both "gone wild". While Schoolteacher couldn't kill Sethe he could kill Sixo, and did so by burning him alive. Paul D also mentions that when Sixo was burning, he kept yelling Seven-O, which we then find out is the name of Sixo's soon to be child.
    
    As we also find out, Paul A (one of Paul D's half brothers) and Halle failed to show when they were supposed to. Paul D is dragged back to the farm by schoolteacher and then sees Sethe, who I get the impression was also supposed to show. Paul D thinks that this must have been right before her rape as it is the last time he sees her for 18 years.
    
    42. Hearing one's price is one of the most demeaning things a person can hear. Someone would pay x amount of dollars for this THING. People do not pay money for people. They pay money for people to do specific services- i.e. maids, but do not pay for the entire person. They pay for animals, being traded in such a way is incredibly degrading. He has no value as a human being, he has no value to them in the way he works, as long as he does work. 

To Paul D, this is end of it all, the end of his humanity. The end of him being treated even potentially well, and he is now an animal. I think this breaks him in a way. We know Halle "broke" when he saw Sethe raped, and I believe that when Paul D heard his "worth" he broke. He no longer believed that he could be the human he wanted to be, and lost something in that. He eventually regained his humanity to a degree but he will always be healing that wound.