—Sanjna Puri
When we were beginning to read Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs, I had absolutely no idea what it was about. I knew it had something to do with slavery but I didn’t know that it would be from the perspective of a slave. I thought it would be more of a historical retelling of slavery. After reading the introduction, I knew that I would really enjoy this book. Slavery has always been a topic in United States history that interested me. It is shocking to me that this even happened in our history. I can’t even begin to imagine how this amount of cruelty and absurdity went on. I can’t even begin to imagine what life must have been like back then and I honestly don’t want to. While reading this, I couldn’t read too much at once because of how intense the content was. The sad thing is I know that the way Jacobs described it can’t even begin to explain the entirety of what she went through. This work of literature is truly heartbreaking yet inspiring at the same time and I am so glad to be reading it. This is by far my favorite book we’ve read all semester. As I am reading, I feel like I am feeling what Jacobs is feeling, in a sense that this book is really moving me and I feel like I can really imagine her talking about her life. At points it feels as though I’m watching a movie in my head of her stories. I really do consider this to be a great work of literature because it exposes us to the harsh reality of slavery from a slave’s perspective. Most accounts about slavery are from a historian’s perspective and I personally have only read things in textbooks about slavery but never from a slave themselves. It is truly heartbreaking the amount of emotion that went into Jacobs’ book. I am really looking forward to finishing this book because it is truly amazing and eye-opening to our dark past.
