Author Archives: EVANTHIA PEIKIDOU

  Reading Harriet Jacob’s, Incident in the Life if a Slave Girl, I realized that it is the first time I read what a woman is going through in slavery. I have seen movies, or read texts but from men slaves. I tried to compare between what Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacob has been through, trying to decide what might be worse, being a male or female slave, but both of them are awful. The moment Harriet escaped her Master and she was hidden in grandmother’s roof I thought that she was almost free, but then she was 7 years in this small space, in the winters where it is cold, in the summers where it is extra hot, in the rain. And there is where I understand that she preferred to leave under all these circumstances for 7 years, than leaving with her Master. Both readings reveal how and why both genders are equally desperate to escape slavery. I feel that it is also very different to read actual facts from people, and read about their feelings and emotions at any event that happened to them. The only thing that can come to mind when thinking what the difference between this two readings might be, is that Harriet Jacob’s language is more casual than Frederick Douglass’s, but they both wanted to tell their story in order to stop slavery.

      When searching the internet for contemporary slavery, I was expecting on how even today, so many years after slavery was abolished,people still  discriminate black people because of their skin color, which of course it was there, but I also came across something else that didn’t even have in mind (for some reason) as a slavery,is human trafficking. Which makes sense, buying and selling people is slavery. Another form of modern slavery, is forced and early marriage, which also makes sense. When there are people and children, that are forced to marry someone for whatever reason, and not being able to deny it, that is slavery. It might not be exactly as it was then, it might be illegal, but it is happening today.

 “ I have already intimated that my condition was much worse, during the first six months of my stay at Mr. Covey’s than in the last six. The circumstances leading to the change in Mr. Covey’s course toward me form an epoch in my humble history. You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall  see how a slave was made a man.” (265)

  I think this is a very important point to the passage because we see a change in Frederick.I I feel  that this statement has a more angry tone than most of his statements, like “enough is enough, I’m gonna take my fate in  my own hands” kind of statement. I noticed that from this point on he is devoted to being a freeman. He mentioned it from the time he learned how to read but I think now is when he is doing everything in his power to make it happen. I also feel it is a small summary. Before this line we read about everything that happened to him from his childhood till now as a slave. And from now on we see him as a slave taking small steps to escape, for example when he was trying to hire his own time. It is very hard to imagine how he must have felt when he had no strength at all to do his work and his master, Mr. Convey, pushed him to go back to work. And after all that when he sought help from Mater Thomas he didn’t do anything. One thing I can clearly see in this autobiography is what a strong person Frederick Douglass was. Mentally and physically. He learned how to read and write by himself, he worked very hard to achieve his goals. A question that immediately came to mind when I read that line is what the other slaves, that did not become free, felt. How they never got to say a story about them escaping slavery. And as much as I was excited to read his story of escaping, I couldn’t stop thinking about the others, who were slaves their whole lives.

  Our first reading this semester was “Du Tenth Sinks the Jewel Box in Anger”. It is very easy to read the text. At the beginning there is a short historical introduction which explains what was going on at that time of period which I find a very interesting way to start the text. The characters of the story have very different backgrounds which emphasize the plot of the story, For example, on the one hand we have young master Li, who had everything ready for him, his entirely life, rich family, didn’t work for money, now he has to try hard find money in order to get Du Tenth, and fails to do so. On the other hand, we have Du Tenth, who was always working as a prostitute, waiting for Li to come and help her get out of this job, but in the end she was the one who helped him.

  One of the reasons I find that this text is a “Great Work” is that you can read the text in many different ways, especially of the main characters. Some people will believe that Du Tenth was right for not telling Li about the Jewel Box, or maybe she should have told him about it, or maybe she used him rather than loved him. The same theory applies to Li, some will believe that he loves Du Tenth, others will be convinced that he wasn’t. One other thought I had about this text is how it is in the 17th century and the idea of how a relationship is, we can still find it happening even today. Some people can relate to the idea that the man should be able to financially support his wife, whi ch is the main “problem” in the story.

  One strong idea this poem has, is how the world spins around money. All of the characters had a financial transaction between them, even an exchange of Du Tenth for money. I think that this is happening today also in many romantic relationships, between friends and family.  Especially at the end when she sinks the Jewel Box, I believe that the message that Feng Menglong might wanted people to learn is how money can control a person, and that it can ruin everything around him. 

 Finally, I think that a great work should have strong ideas and that we can gain something after finish reading it, even if this is a lesson to be taught or something that will open our minds to a new idea and I believe that this text had strong ideas such as money control people and a lesson that we learned.