While I was reading Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass, An American slave, the book was so vivid that I felt as if I was watching a movie. The way the central character, Fredrick Douglas narrates his life story as a slave, its so heart touching and sad as well. There are so many things to be said about this narrative but without tempting myself with so many ideas, I will focus on some factor which actually provoked him to gain his freedom.
Brutality towards a salve is one of the key ingredients of this narrative which Douglas encounter at very early age. I think, at some point, the brutality made him think about gaining his freedom. Throughout the entire story, we can see so many scenes of brutality. Douglas narrated his terrifying first experience when his aunt, Hester was getting brutally punished by his master because of disobeying his order and meeting with another man (C 1.P 4).My personal interpretation about this brutality towards a slave was not just to punished them but also producing enormous amount of fear in them so that they can’t even think about standing up to their master. The death of a salve was the cheapest thing ever, even the kid says “it was worth a half cent to kill a “nigger”, and a half cent to bury one” (C4 P12). In the narrative we see couples of time Douglas get punished by his masters without any valid reason. Perhaps, this brutality made him believe that he doesn’t deserve it as a human being so he needed to be free in order to gain a normal human life.
Alienation from the rest of the world is also a key factor that provoked Douglas to think about his freedom. According to the narrative, if we look back early 19th century of American society, slaves weren’t aware of their age (C1, P1). Since ignorance was the intension of the masters, they never really looked at the slaves as real humans but as if they were nothing significant. As a central character, Douglas didn’t know who his father was. He was separated from his mother at an early age, even when his mother died he didn’t feel anything special about it. The reason behind the alienation was to make them salves in mentality, as well, where they were physically born slaves. The fact that the slaves were so convinced about their enslaved lifestyle, it made the slave masters quite successful to turn them mentally crippled. The perfect example, for instance, would be when the slaves form different plantation fighting with each other about whose master is richer, kinder and smarter. Instead of being concerned about their own miserable life, they’re more concerned about who they represent(C 3 P 9). This alienation influenced questions in young Douglas’s mind we see him asking why the white children knew their age and he didn’t (C1P1). His questions were the first initiative towards his freedom.
The vivid imagery of a slave’s experience was horrifying. They were treated as animals or objects. We see that in the narrative, whenever the ownership changed, they counted with the livestock as a property. Overall, all the factors provoked Frederick Douglas to find a way to gain his freedom because he wanted a normal human life, not the life of an animal. In search of that, he found that reading and writing is the only thing that can give him freedom. In the narrative, we also see his struggle for learning to read and write. It was determined by his master that education for Douglas would be a threat because they thought that if he accomplished reading and writing, he’ll become unmanageable as a slave. We see how he saves his bread and gives that bread to the poor white children in the neighborhood, and in return, they taught him how to read. In the end, we found that all his struggles paid off. He was able to escape to New York and eventually earn his freedom. Most importantly, he finally learned the real meaning of abolition (movement to end slavery). This narrative was a great example to the existing slaves of that time and inspired them to follow his footstep.
Parvez
I totally agree with your point where you said that learning how to read and write is a threat for his master. Before I point out the main idea that I want to say, I am going to pick a passage from chapter 10 page 41 that we discussed earlier in class which relate to what your point. It says, “ I have observed this in my experience of slavery, – that whenever my condition was improved, instead of its increasing my contentment, it only increased my desire to be free, and set me to thinking of plans to gain freedom”. Basically, Douglas states that the more knowledgeable he is, the more he wants to gain his freedom. That is why it relates with your point where you say that education is such a threat for his master. In this context, they have a paradigm that slaves are defined as very low class of people that is born to follow his master, that is why they don’t have to be educated or know other things besides obeying their masters’ orders. For that reason, Douglas wants to take out that paradigm and gains his freedom by being knowledgeable.
I agree with your points. As I read the beginning of story, I thought that Frederick was stuffy. Why he didn’t really argue or fight back even though he saw the brutalities? He would sense that he or all the other salves were not treated as human being. Also, he had nothing to lose. Then, he finally fought back to his master. It was really significant turning point to him that he was eager to gain freedom. I felt that it was cool, but I worried that something bad would happen to him.
I also felt sad and scared when I read the story. I thought that Frederick was born in a bad world. It’s not only him, but the people who were born during that period were also. As Parvez mentioned, I was so shocked that they didn’t know their ages. It really made me feel bad because they just accepted it as normal. The birthday is a special day whether they can or can’t celebrate for it. He didn’t know who was his father and he was separated from his mother. If his masters had a least of conscience, he would be treated as a human being. The salves were not animal. They were just workers and human being like same as all others. It didn’t really matter with who they were. It was just matter with how they looked.
I have the same feeling as yours. Through the article, we can see that slaves are worthless. They have no rights to control their body. They would be punished by their master easily. Punishing one person can become a warning to others so everyone can behave.
It is poor for those slaves to be taken away when they were born. Nothing can replace mother’s love and they dont even have a replacement. As you said, they were born slaves and being a slave is all they have.
The idea of keeping slaves away from reading and writing is important. Douglass said “Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave” . The reason he said that is because once you know reading and write, you start to become a critical thinker which can challenge their masters. Knowledge is the power which others can take away from you.
I agree with you that brutality is definitely a key ingredient in this narrative. As Ely asked us what were some of the themes of this piece, brutality was the first thing that came to my mind. Like you said, the vivid imagery was definitely what let this brutality come to life in my mind. I would cringe as Frederick Douglas would describe the whippings, the blood, and the mangled bodies. What I also found interesting was how the Frederick Douglas would talk about the slave master, his horse, and the horse’s caretakers; who were slaves. The slave master would brutally beat the caretakers if he thought the horse had too much to eat or if the horse simply did not get enough attention from people that day. Frederick Douglas purposely included this in his narrative because it symbolizes how even animals were treated better than the slaves themselves. These poor slaves, who were malnourished themselves, would get beaten if an animal was not fed properly.
I agree with what you said about alienation being a key factor for slaves. Frederick Douglas’ story provides a way for us to understand how the slaves were influenced and what aspects of the master’s power enabled them to have full control. It was crucial for the masters to ensure that their slaves did no receive any education because any small amount of knowledge would have given them a taste of what else was out there. As Douglas says, the more freedom and leeway he was given, especially toward the end of his slavery days, the more he yearned for complete freedom. When he had a taste of what freedom would be like and began managing his own money and contracting his own work, it planted a larger seed in him to want his full freedom. He felt more damaged pride in giving his money to his owner each week when he was less of slave.
I agree with what you said about alienation being a key factor for slaves. Frederick Douglas’ story provides a way for us to understand how the slaves were influenced and what aspects of the master’s power enabled them to have full control. Alienating the slaves was very important because without literary or common knowledge they could have no ideas about another lifestyle, their life as slave would be all they know. Douglas perhaps survived and ended up a free man because of his determination to learn to read and gain literacy. It opened doors for him that many of his fellow slaves did not have access too. It may have been the sole reason for the strength and perseverance that he possessed which allowed him to get as far as he did. It was crucial for the masters to ensure that their slaves did not receive any education because any small amount of knowledge would have given them a taste of what else was out there. As Douglas says, the more freedom and leeway he was given, especially toward the end of his slavery days, the more he yearned for complete freedom. When he had a taste of what freedom would be like and began managing his own money and contracting his own work, it planted a larger seed in him to want his full freedom. He felt more damaged pride in giving his money to his owner each week when he was less of slave. The closer he came to living like a free man only opened his eyes more and more and propelled him to escape. The worse his conditions were, the less he thought about freedom. At first this seemed ironic to me, but now it kind of makes sense. It was so far away at his lowest points that he looked at it as an inaccessible dream.
I completely agree with you in that brutality plays an important role in the narrative. The way that these slaves were treated was horrible. Frederick Douglass explained specific episodes where slaves were tortured, whipped and even killed. Something that shocked me was how gory some of the scenes were, they made me want to cry every time I read them. Just like you wrote the vivid imagery was pretty terrifying.I had to stop reading in some parts because it was difficult to picture the bloody scenes and just how terrible these slave owners were. One scene that I remember was how he saw his aunt being whipped, this scene really made me cringe. It was quite sad how Frederick Douglass reflected on his life and how he and others were treated like animals. Frederick had to suffer a lot throughout his life and he had to see how his friends and family were tortured, it’s pretty amazing that he was able to withstand all of what he went through, and that he finally was able to live a free life.
I also agreed with the points you given. You made some good points about Douglass trying to learn to read. I felt from Douglass point of view, that the master did not want the slaves to gain any knowledge. The master had to strip the slaves of their own identity and treat them like a number. Douglas did not even know his real name until the end of the story. Making matters worse Douglas never known who his parents was. The way they knew how to accomplish this was by not teaching the slaves how to read. A slave that knows how to read will eventually gain enough knowledge to set himself free like Douglas at the end of the story. Also Douglass has described very welled detailed the brutality he witness through the narrative especially to his Aunt Hester. One thing that I found ironic and it was a theme throughout the story was religion. It is funny how the more religious a master is the more brutal he is. I also found it very amazing how for someone who just became literate, is able to write a story so well organized and detailed with very vivid image like you mentioned.
I completely agree with what you said and I also like the way you broke down the story in this way. The part that stuck out to me the most in your blog post was when you start to talk about alienation. The masters had a whole plan in why they wanted to keep these slaves alienated from the rest. First the more these slaves learned, and more they wanted to do things individually, they wanted and yearned for freedom that much more. When Frederick Douglass was being thought by Mrs. Auld, her husband forbade it and said “A nigger should know nothing but to obey his master—to do as he is told to do. Learning would spoil the best nigger in the world. Now,” said he, “if you teach that nigger (speaking of myself) how to read, there would be no keeping him. It would forever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once become unmanageable, and of no value to his master.”(15) By stating this, Douglass master was implying that he should be alienated from any necessities a human-being should have. Even though what his master said was brutal and he was alienating him, he was correct because towards the end of the narrative Douglass says “I have observed this in my experience of slavery,—that whenever my condition was improved, instead of its increasing my contentment, it only increased my desire to be free, and set me to thinking of plans to gain my freedom.”(41) With this statement Douglass is proving his master Auld’s statement because whenever he earned more freedom and moved away from the alienation that his master had created, the more he wanted freedom, and wanted to get away from slavery.
This also explains the brutality that Douglass felt all of his life. His master knew that the slightest form of compassion, or getting adjusted to real life scenarios, a slave would no longer want to do his duties as a slave. This was the only way that Douglass’s master could keep him suppressed from anything that was from the free world. This also gave Douglass the idea later on his life that whenever he acquired something towards freedom, he would want it much more and nothing would stop him. That is why Douglass was able to get his freedom and walk a free man, and truly find out the true meaning of abolition. Without the first thought of freedom, Douglass would have probably never got to walk as a free man, and his master would have kept him alienated.
Overall this story really shocked me in how descriptive Frederick Douglass’ life as a slave was like. The different people that he encountered throughout his life and the struggle stat he went through are what defined him after he was free. That amount of brutality that he witnessed and the pain that he and others went through was really expressed in his narrative. I completely agree with you in that brutality plays an important role in the narrative. The way that these slaves were treated was horrible. Frederick Douglass explained specific episodes where slaves were tortured, whipped and even killed. Something that shocked me was how gory some of the scenes were, they made me want to cry every time I read them. Just like you wrote the vivid imagery was pretty terrifying.I had to stop reading in some parts because it was difficult to picture the bloody scenes and just how terrible these slave owners were. One scene that I remember was how he saw his aunt being whipped, this scene really made me cringe. The way in which he described the amount of blood that his aunt had lost and how he saw that as just a young child must have haunted him for the rest of his life. It was quite sad how Frederick Douglass reflected on his life and how he and others were treated like animals, these people were treated like a garbage. The slave owners didn’t care about them, they just cared about money. Frederick had to suffer a lot throughout his life and he had to see how his friends and family were tortured, it’s pretty amazing that he was able to withstand all of what he went through, and that he finally was able to live a free life. Douglass acquired all what we should have our freedom.
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